


Full Disclosure

by pennysparkle



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Childhood Friends, F/F, F/M, M/M, Organized Crime
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-02-01
Updated: 2014-01-26
Packaged: 2017-11-27 19:37:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 154,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/665676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pennysparkle/pseuds/pennysparkle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Amidst the uprising of a vicious criminal organization, a bolt from the blue strikes Zoro’s life in the form of a childhood friend, who proceeds to reinstate his presence in several unexpected ways.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Body of Years

**Author's Note:**

> Title of this chapter is from "Body of Years" by Mother Mother. And I'm intending to update this every Friday at the moment, but that's all subject to change.

It seemed like Zoro had just fallen asleep when the phone rang; the gruff voice on the other end sounded equally displeased about the hour as it explained, succinctly as possible, the incident - Queens, beast of a fire, most likely the latest in somebody's quest to piss a lot of people off.

He got out of bed slowly, muscles still aching a little. The uniform was on his floor where he'd shucked it off at 4am. A little wrinkled, of course, but it would do. He hadn't had a chance to get any laundry done with all the running around these past couple weeks.

On the scene, Smoker handed him a styrofoam cup and walked him over to the witnesses. They didn't play a game of good cop, bad cop, so much as mean cop, meaner cop - though most of the group of shivering, blanketed people seemed just as pissed as they did. Still, they detailed the happenings as well as they could: huge hulking figure shrouded in darkness, suspicious but not _actually_ guilty of anything.

Of course, the fact that that figure had been spotted near every single one of the smoldering crime scenes so far was reason enough to suspect them. It almost seemed like they were taunting the police: allowing themselves to be seen, but slipping through their fingers like water. It was frustrating, to say the least.

The last ember wasn't put out until well past noon. At that point, the streets held only a trickle of firemen, medics, and other officers trying to tie up loose ends. Most of the inhabitants of the building were probably settling in at the hospital now, and the remainders were looking frumpy and put-out as they answered questions for the straggling officers.

Having had more than enough, Zoro headed for his cruiser after foisting the paperwork off on his tiny partner, who nodded in sympathy as Zoro growled about having today _off_ , damn it.

Of course, he knew better than to believe he'd get away clean. He was intercepted a scant few feet from his car by Ace, whose face was a sooty mess, dark enough to cover up his freckles.

"Should go to lunch while we're over here," he commented offhandedly. "I know a place."

Zoro hemmed and hawed for a little bit, because he really just wanted to go back home, crawl into bed, and sleep for twelve hours.

"I'll pay," Ace wheedled, tucking his bright yellow helmet tighter under his arm.

Zoro's eyebrow twitched a little, but he finally gave in. He hadn't had a bite to eat since being pulled from bed that morning, and he'd probably end up falling asleep in traffic anyway. At the very least, he could get a little coffee and a burger in his system.

The place was squeezed in between a tumbledown apartment complex and one of those skuzzy hipster thrift shops. Its sign read _Baratie_ in simple serif, and you could barely see inside for all the people crowded outside.

Honestly, he didn't think they had any business eating at a place like this. For one thing, everyone else was wearing neat suits or skirt sets, and here they were - a policeman in uniform and a fireman who still had smears of ash along the sides of his face, stripped out of his uniform to jeans and a Descendents t-shirt. For another thing, one glance at the menus sitting on the podium revealed just how much it was going to be costing Ace for their little side-trip.

It was blessedly warm inside, though, probably because of how packed it was with human bodies. But the savory smell wafting through the air was what really convinced Zoro that the price and his feelings of displacement would be worth it.

"I know the head chef," Ace said with a wink. "It should be easy to get a table."

Sure enough, the girl standing at the podium smiled brightly at Ace, greeted him by name, and led them to a booth tucked in near the kitchen doors. It was less crowded back here, and gave Ace an eye line into the kitchen, which he swiftly took advantage of by waving someone out.

Someone with blond hair hanging over one eye, someone slim with legs for days. Someone that looked exactly like a blast from the past.

"Sanji!" Ace greeted, and received a nod in return.

"San...ji?" Zoro asked.

The object of their focus turned an impassive face on him, but then his visible eye widened and his brow furrowed, mouth opening just a little. "Zoro?"

"Hmm, someone you know?" Ace asked Zoro, with a smirk on his face that implied he wasn't completely ignorant in this.

"Childhood enemies," Sanji said, amused, before Zoro could reply. Zoro nodded.

_Summer in the countryside. The smell of lavender blossoms, wheat tickling their bare feet. Sweat dripping down the small of Zoro's back. Dirt in his hair. Kneecap in his gut._

_They were tussling, not for the first time today. It had started after Zeff had served up the last blondie with a side of butter pecan ice cream and suggested they share it or face his wrath. They might have had a little disagreement about how to split it._

_Now they were in the field out back, huffing and shoving and kicking. Dessert was long forgotten._

" _You stupid bastard," Sanji panted, forcing his knees tighter around Zoro's ribs. "I hate your stupid face! Why do you have to show up around here all the time!"_

" _I'm telling your dad you said that!"_

" _Bastard! Bastard! Bastard!" Sanji said, as Zoro tried to buck him off. For such a stringy kid, he was strong, and kept holding on. "I don't care! He's the one who taught me!"_

_Zoro grabbed him by the waist and toppled them both over, drawing back an arm and socking him hard in the stomach. His legs loosened by increments, and finally fell._

_They never sparred - Koshiro was really strict about who they were allowed to do that with, and Sanji wasn't trained the way Zoro was. He tended, usually, to rub that in Sanji's face._

_But their tussling was an everyday occurrence, and he often heard his adoptive dad lamenting their 'antagonistic' relationship (whatever that meant) on the phone at night when he and Kuina were supposed to be tucked in._

_Kuina scolded him about it too, but she was just as apt to defend Zoro from Sanji as she was to yell at him for being such a mule._

_Sanji rolled onto his back in the dirt, soft blond hair falling over his face, a smudge of dirt on his chin._

" _I hate you, you bastard," he said, and if five years later, watching Sanji and Zeff disappear as he looked out the back of his family's station wagon, Zoro realized that the feeling in the pit of his chest at that moment was love, then he just tightened his jaw and resolved to forget about it._

"I didn't know you were out here now," Zoro said, politely. He was a lot older now - twenty three years from the first time they'd met, eleven from the last time they'd seen each other. He'd done a lot of maturing. A lot of learning when to keep his mouth shut, and when to act like a fucking adult. The force was good at teaching you those things.

Sanji shrugged. "The old man got a big opportunity here and we decided to take it."

"Oh. What a small world," Zoro said lamely.

"Thank god for that," Sanji replied sardonically. "Anyway, since I'm out here, what can I get you two?"

"Coffee," they said in unison.

"And the duckbeak burger," Ace said.

Zoro cleared his throat, trailing his eyes over the menu slowly. "The chili... same as your dad used to make?"

"Basically," Sanji said with a wry twist to his mouth. "I've made some changes, but it's mostly the same."

"That, then."

"Sour cream and cheese still okay?"

"Yeah."

"Alright," Sanji nodded. "If I don't see you before you leave, it was really good to see you again."

"Yeah, you too," Zoro replied with a small smile, and it wasn't just a formality for him when he put as much warmth into his voice as he could muster.

Sanji nodded once more, returning the smile, and walked back through the swinging doors.

"Childhood enemies, huh?" Ace asked with a goofy grin. "Seem to be doing okay now."

Zoro rolled his eyes. "We were kids. Apparently we've both grown up."

"Pff. I know how abrasive both of you can be."

"Well it's not like we've seen each other in over a decade. We barely know each other now."

Ace shrugged. "No time like the present."

Zoro snorted and shook his head before putting it down on his folded arms and closing his eyes. The clink of china touching down on the table stirred him a few minutes later, and he looked up to see a girl with pastel blue hair pulled up in a ponytail.

"Sorry," she said with a sweet smile. "Sanji had to get back to work. I'll be serving you."

"You say that as if it's a hardship," Ace said with a grin.

"Don't try to flatter me, Ace," the girl said, but she smiled back all the same.

"How are you, Vivi?" he asked.

"Trucking through, I guess. Busy today. And you?"

"Tired!" Ace exclaimed, and Zoro was slightly ashamed that he jumped at the sudden burst of noise.

She turned back to Zoro and her smile softened a little. "Need anything else, or do you want to get back to your nap?" Though her words were a tinge caustic, she seemed almost motherly.

"I'm good, thanks," Zoro said, half-muffled by the sleeve of his jacket.

"Alrighty. Back in a few."

When a bowl was placed in front of Zoro, he snapped out of his sleepy daze and inhaled that nostalgic scent, almost shivering at the warmth rolling off of it.

_Winter, now. The snow on the ground was a foot deep already, but the kitchen was perfectly warm, and watching fat flakes of snow drift past the window was lulling him into content._

" _Give it a taste," Zeff said to Sanji, who had just hit his first growth spurt and seemed to have shot up half a foot overnight._

_Sanji took the proffered spoon and dipped it in the pot, blew on it gently, and put it in his mouth._

" _Good," he murmured. "It's done."_

_Zeff took a spoonful too, to be sure, and nodded._

_Sanji ladled out five bowls with perfect, careful movements, not spilling a drop. He topped them with cheese, sour cream, and spring onion while Zeff piled slices of warm, herby bread onto a plate._

" _Dinner!" the old man shouted into the living room, and the patter of slippered feet filled the dining room. Kuina passed Zoro, and he half-listened to her offering to help carry dinner to the table._

" _I could never ask a lady to do such menial work in this kitchen," Sanji said, only his voice cracked halfway through, and Zoro snorted out a laugh._

" _Oi, why don't you come help then, lazy bastard?"_

" _Hnn," hummed Zoro, sliding off the barstool and shuffling over to grab the two bowls that Sanji was holding out for him._

" _Don't drop them, or I'll have your balls."_

" _I wasn't aware you knew what balls looked like yet," Zoro countered._

" _OI." There was a bright flush over the bridge of Sanji's nose, and maybe Zoro wanted to brush his fingers over it._

_Instead, he tightened them around the bowls and smirked a little. "Relax. If an empty-headed cook like you can carry some bowls to the table, I can too."_

_And so he did, placing them down in front of his father and Zeff. Sanji was right behind him, reaching over Kuina's shoulder to put one down in front of her._

" _Thanks," Kuina said, picking up her spoon immediately._

" _Anything for my beautiful Kuina!" Sanji exclaimed._

" _Shut up," she replied._

_Sanji visibly wilted, but worked his disappointment off by fussing at Zoro instead. "Here, idiot."_

" _Thanks," said Zoro._

" _Hmph." He placed the last bowl in front of his own chair, next to Zeff and across from Kuina (because if there was one thing the adults had quickly learned, it was that putting Zoro and Sanji across from each other led to lots of kicking), then settled down._

_Kuina, Zoro, and Koshiro all bowed their heads and murmured, "Thank you for this meal." Then they dug in with the kind of enthusiasm that only their family was capable of._

_The first bite was hot and perfect, burning on the way down but filling his mouth with the taste of spice and meat and beans. The second bite soothed it with sour cream, and Zoro's closed eyes kept him from seeing the way Sanji's flicked toward him and his lips curled up just a touch in satisfaction._

Some things you'd leave behind for years but the second they came back, you'd remember them perfectly, and as he took the first bite, Zoro was carried back to wintertime in the Black household. It made him think of tumultuous sleigh rides in his backyard, Sanji's arms holding tight around him; of hot chocolate with cayenne pepper and the year where Zeff first trusted Sanji to make his sweet, flaky chocolatines; of soaking wet socks, sitting in front of the fireplace until his cold skin felt like it had baked through.

And yet there were different things about it too - it was richer, spicier, thicker with the addition of more beans and meat. Didn't go down as easy but left a heat behind that Zoro liked.

He wolfed it down in record time, actually managing to keep up with Ace for once. By the time he was done, he felt incredibly full, and he'd finished two cups of coffee, but it was probably the spice that was starting to make him feel so alert.

They were about to leave when Sanji hustled forth from the kitchen and called out, "Wait up!"

Zoro stopped, turned.

"Give me your number. We should catch up sometime."

Pleasure filled his chest and he had to take a moment to remember his own number. Sanji dutifully inputted it, and a few seconds later, Zoro's phone chimed with a text.

' _sanji ;)_ ' it read, and Zoro smiled down at it.

* * *

Zoro got home around 2 in the afternoon, took a quick shower, and passed out on his bed without drying off. He woke up an hour later, tossed the towel across the room and crawled naked under the sheets.

He slept for another six hours and finally dragged himself out of bed a little before 10. Dinner was leftover Chinese takeout in front of an episode of Criminal Minds (he seriously lacked a single squeamish cell in his body at this point) and dessert was a handful of peanuts with a round of Temple Run on his phone - or so he had planned, until he saw a message from Sanji upon tapping it awake.

' _let's go drinking some night. when are you free?_ '

The timestamp said 8:59, so he probably wasn't that late answering but he made sure to start with an apology anyway. He was almost a little desperate to not have Sanji think he was putting him off.

' _sorry, was sleeping. i'm mostly working the night patrol this week but i have thursday and friday off._ '

Sanji's reply was prompt. ' _ah, the sleeping habits of an officer. i'm working thursday and friday nights :( damn._ '

Zoro had to chuckle a little at Sanji using emoticons. ' _what are you doing tonight?_ ' he texted back on the spur of the moment.

' _nothing. sitting on the couch watching man vs food._ '

' _you should come over. i have a 24 pack of shiner and 7 different flavors of b &j's in the freezer._'

' _you had me at seven different flavors. where you at?_ '

' _prospect heights._ '

' _oh hey! i'm over in brooklyn heights._ _i can be there in about half an hour._ '

' _awesome. see you soon._ '

Sure enough, the doorbell rang a little over half an hour later and Zoro jumped up hastily to answer it. Of course, it wasn't until he'd cracked the door open that he remember he'd only put on a pair of flannel sleep pants after getting out of bed. The blast of cold air made his skin prickle into goosebumps as he swung the door completely open.

"Woah. That's intense," Sanji said, eyeing the long scar across Zoro's abdomen, before snapping his gaze upward. His cheeks were flushed, probably from the cold, and Zoro stepped back to let him in.

"Sorry. Rude. I brought you leftovers from dinner. French dip sandwich. Hopefully you still like them."

"Yeah," Zoro said. Sanji was wearing dark black jeans, cognac-colored 14-hole Doc Martens, a backpack slung over one shoulder, and a pea coat with the collar turned up to allow a blue striped scarf around his neck and chin. Everything fit him like a second skin. As he turned to shut the door, Zoro was treated with an excellent view of the way his ass filled out his jeans, and he had to force himself not to drool a little.

"Kitchen's this way," he muttered, leading Sanji through the archway.

"Do you want this now, or in the fridge?" Sanji asked. "I wrote down the directions for you, just in case. It's simple though, just heating things up and putting them together."

"Eh, go ahead now. I'd rather have the professional do it."

Sanji nodded, then set to preheating the oven. After, he stepped back into the small connected dining room, dropped his backpack, and started shucking off his scarf and jacket. Underneath, he was wearing a green and white button-up with the top two buttons undone, and he paused to straighten it out where it had rucked up a little.

Zoro didn't fucking understand how the short, skinny kid he grew up with had become such a bombshell. He was still slim, but there were the telltale signs of muscle underneath, and he was practically level with Zoro height-wise. He was really working that weird goatee, too. But it was more than that. Maybe it was the fact that he finally held himself with a manner of confidence. Or maybe it was that his face was exactly the same, but now it looked kindly upon Zoro.

He distracted himself from thinking about it by grabbing a couple cans of beer out of the fridge, and handed one to Sanji.

"Thanks," he said with a smile, and so what if Zoro melted a little.

"No problem," he mumbled back, popping the tab of his can and taking a long, steadying drink.

Sanji turned away to grab a cutting board from its place on a peg over the stove, then a knife from the block. He opened his bag, pulling out several tupperware containers, and took the lids off of them to begin layering bread, mustard, cheese, and roast beef onto a baking sheet. By the time he was done, the oven had beeped, and he carefully transferred the sheet into it.

Next, he took a pan from the rack overhead, and tossed butter and chopped onions in it.

He moved so naturally, but with care and almost a tenderness toward every ingredient he touched. Zoro found it more than a little mesmerizing. Obviously Sanji was a lot more at home in the kitchen now than he was even a decade ago.

"It's professionally frowned upon to microwave things but I guess it won't matter if this is just au jus," Sanji said, reaching over to stir the onions quickly and efficiently. "Just don't tell anyone."

Smirking, Zoro tossed his empty can in the trash and moved to grab another from the fridge. "The only person I'd need to tell is your dad. He'd chew you out so hard you wouldn't need anyone else to know to feel ashamed."

Sanji laughed, a rough, low sound. "True."

Zoro went quiet, only handing Sanji a plate when he asked for one. He watched him take the sandwich out of the oven, forking sautéed onions onto it before tucking the lid back on top, then poured the reheated au jus into a small bowl.

"Go get yourself another beer and sit down."

"Treating me like a guest in my own home?"

Sanji shrugged, opening one last container. "That's the job of a good chef, isn't it?"

"You're making me feel pretty inadequate at my hosting duties."

"You can make it up to me later," Sanji said with a wink. "After all, I brought you homemade salt and vinegar chips. You're gonna have to do something really good for me."

Zoro didn't even really have the presence of mind to pay attention, because all he could imagine was _making it up to Sanji_ in very illicit manners.

"Go on," Sanji continued. "I'll be there in a second."

Zoro made his way back to the living room and kicked aside the throw that was laying half on, half off the sofa. The TV was showing infomercials on this channel now, and he took a moment to laugh at how _miserable_ some people were at perfectly ordinary tasks.

Then Sanji was coming in with two plates, one with the sandwich and the other with... Castella cake, a couple lit candles sticking out. Zoro breathed in sharply as Sanji sat the sandwich down in front of him.

"I remembered your birthday was a couple days ago," Sanji said with a small shrug. "And this was the only cake you'd eat when you were younger."

Zoro had to smile as Sanji held the plate of cake in both hands, waiting for Zoro to blow the candles out. "Make a wish," Sanji said, and Zoro leaned forward, took in a deep breath, groped around for a wish somewhere inside himself, then blew the candles out in one gust.

He took the plate from Sanji's hands before he could set it down, and passed him the remote in trade. "Guest gets to pick."

Sanji made disparaging remarks as he thumbed through channels, and Zoro found he liked that dry, sarcastic humor. The Sanji he'd known when he was younger was full of a vitriolic, angst-ridden humor, but he supposed the same could be said for a lot of teenagers.

Finally, he settled on a rerun of The Walking Dead and Zoro made a soft 'hmm' noise.

"Don't say anything," Sanji demanded.

"Wasn't gonna. The second season wasn't my thing really but the first one's alright."

"Too much drama for you?"

"Too much bullshit, not enough zombies."

Sanji laughed and shrugged his shoulders in a conceding motion.

"If I wanted to see an abusive husband, his daughter contracting a horrible disease, the falling-apart of a solid relationship, a guy who thinks he has any kind of claim over a woman just because she had sex with him, and somebody's son's descent into sociopathy, I'd watch a soap opera," Zoro muttered.

"Fair enough."

Zoro took up the fork on the plate and sliced off a chunk of the cake, popping it into his mouth with far too much excitement for somebody who was just eating. Sanji tsked softly, and sighed, "Dessert before dinner? Heathen."

He didn't bother with an answer. Sanji had never made this cake for him before, so he assumed it was Zeff's recipe. But it tasted faintly of strawberries where Zeff had only made plain old Castella for him before, and he found that he liked it. It wasn't as sickeningly sweet as strawberry shortcake, and that was just perfect for him.

"Good," he managed between bites, and Sanji smiled at him, clearly pleased but a little bashful about it.

"I'm glad."

They were silent as Zoro polished off the rest of the cake, then sat the plate on the table and started in on the sandwich. Despite leftovers an hour before, he tended to always have an appetite, and even this would only sate it temporarily, especially at the rate he ate it, taking breaks only to force it all down with swigs of beer.

"Hey," Sanji said, after a few minutes. "Anywhere I can take a smoke break?"

Zoro paused with a chip halfway to his mouth. "You can open one of the windows or you can go on the back porch." He said porch, but it was more like a stoop looking onto a tiny "garden" with a wooden fence covered in graffiti on one side separating it from an alleyway.

"Thanks," Sanji replied. He stood slowly, and Zoro noted that he seemed to favor his back.

"You alright?"

"Yeah, just overworking myself lately," he called from the dining room. He emerged moments later wearing his coat and scarf again, holding a pack of cigarettes in one leather-gloved hand. "Point me to the porch?"

Zoro stood too, grabbing his coat from the hallway closet and shuffling his feet into the fuzzy pink slippers Ace had gifted him with last Christmas. They passed the stairs and the bathroom, which Zoro dutifully pointed out to him. He unlocked the back door, which creaked open slowly, and stepped out onto the tiny stoop.

"You don't have to stand out here with me," Sanji said around the cigarette in his mouth, palm cupped as he flicked his lighter hushing him even more.

"I don't mind." Zoro sat on the cold concrete stairs. His breath came out in clouds of smoke, it was so cold out. A cat yowled close by, and somebody was listening to house music way too loudly a ways down the alley. Traffic could be heard beyond the stifling bricked sanctuary. Somebody honked their horn in increasingly aggressive patterns. Here on Zoro's back porch, the only sound that seemed tangible was Sanji's breath as he blew out smoke.

He folded his arms, sandwiching them between his head and his knees, and turned his gaze to look up at Sanji. Somehow, the image of him smoking was both quaint and attractive. He was probably such a lady killer now. They probably fell in his lap left and right.

"What are you looking at me like that for?" Sanji asked, tapping ash off into the dead grass below.

"Just thinking."

"About what?" Sanji didn't seem overwhelmingly curious, but Zoro remembered from childhood - if he tried to avoid answering things, Sanji would latch on like a sloth to a particularly nice branch.

"Just that you're probably beating ladies off constantly now."

"Certainly beating _something_ off," Sanji commented with a dry chuckle. Zoro couldn't help his startled laugh in response.

"You don't really expect me to believe that."

"I don't mind demonstrating for you."

Zoro turned red and opened his mouth to say _something_ when he was interrupted by several people screaming, which trailed off into loud giggles. He rolled his eyes. People could be so annoying.

One last puff, and Sanji crouched down to grind the cigarette butt on the concrete. Zoro took it from him and dropped it into the trashcan on his side of the stoop before standing, hands clasped tight in his fuzzy, fur-lined pockets.

They made their way back inside, Zoro toeing off his slippers and shrugging out of his coat by the front door. Sanji did the same with much more elegance, tucking his scarf over his coat and depositing both on the back of a dining chair.

For an hour or so, they hunched on the couch. Sanji had kicked his boots off and stretched his legs out to rest on the coffee table. At some point, more beer was brought out, along with several containers of ice cream for Sanji, and they'd changed channels ten minutes into The Breakfast Club.

"It's a classic," Sanji said, very defensively. Zoro had to laugh.

"You're Claire."

"Does that make you Bender? Tough asshole with a heart of gold?"

Zoro snorted. "Gonna give me your earrings?"

"Gonna give me a kiss?" Sanji retorted, leaning closer. He batted his eyelashes a couple times, and Zoro was suddenly overwhelmingly confronted with just how blue Sanji's eyes were.

He cleared his throat and wiped his palms on his pants a few times, the mood suddenly shifted from teasing to awkwardly serious. "I'm not reading this wrong, am I?"

"If what you're reading is that I've been flirting aggressively at you all night, then no, you're definitely not reading it wrong."

"This is new. You not being obsessed with women."

"It's not as new as you think," Sanji said, and then his mouth was a palm's breadth away from Zoro's.

He leaned up slowly, in case Sanji second-guessed himself, but he only moved closer in turn. Their lips touched gently at first, then Sanji's hand moved to Zoro's shoulder, and Zoro's hand moved to the nape of Sanji's neck, and they melted into each other.

Sanji kissed playfully, nipping gently at Zoro's lips, smiling and laughing, drawing him out until Zoro grabbed him by the cheeks and firmly kissed him into submission. It wound languidly on, then was stopped abruptly as Sanji moved into Zoro's lap.

"Less neck-destroying this way," Sanji murmured, placing a soft peck on Zoro's lips.

"Mm," Zoro replied, wrapping one arm around Sanji's hip to pull him close. He moved with no fuss, sinking down into the cup of Zoro's thighs.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd actually had _fun_ making out with somebody. Some people, it was a fight, some people it was foreplay, some people seemed to think it was an obligation. Sanji was _fun_ though, toying with Zoro ruthlessly until he did the same right back. His stubble burned pleasantly against Zoro's face. He smiled, and laughed against Zoro's mouth, and he liked to draw little smiley faces with his tongue, which Zoro didn't notice at first - but he was laughing just as much when he figured out that there was a pattern to the little _poke, poke, half-circle_ motions.

"Hmm. You're better at that than I thought, moss-for-brains," Sanji whispered a while later. They'd caught their breath and Sanji had settled down, resting his face against Zoro's shoulder. Occasionally, he'd puff out a little breath and tickle Zoro's ear, setting his earrings to chiming together softly.

Zoro grunted and pressed his fingers into the base of Sanji's spine. "Had to find something to get up to after we moved here."

"You miss fighting with me all the time?" Sanji asked with a chuckle.

"Oh yeah. I thought about all those times you wrapped your legs around my neck and tried to strangle me with them when I jerked off for about a month at one point."

Sanji rolled his eyes and shook his head. "No you didn't."

Zoro had, but he wouldn't correct Sanji. He'd thought of that, and all the times he'd pinned Sanji down almost effortlessly - he'd had his first growth spurt almost two years before Sanji, so it was very easy - and how Sanji's face would flush with anger because of it. And he'd thought of those times after Sanji's growth spurt, where he'd kept Zoro down with just his strong legs.

For months after moving, no matter who entered his life and became an object of his affections, Sanji remained as the object of his _obsessions_. Even years later, he'd occasionally think of those things during a dry spot, in the same way he'd thought of certain sexual quirks of past partners while jerking off.

"Well, I'm glad you found something productive to do with your time, at least," Sanji said, dragging his mouth up under Zoro's chin, and sucked ruthlessly.

Head fallen back against the top of the sofa, Zoro stared up the ceiling and let his hands cup Sanji's slim hips, drawing him into a slow movement against Zoro's crotch.

Soon, he didn't need any direction, moving fluidly and easily, making Zoro groan every time Sanji's ass ground against his cock. But Zoro refused to let go of his hips and as Sanji drew himself up to kiss Zoro's mouth, he moved his hips up in counterpoint to Sanji.

They kissed and shoved against each other until they were both breathless, and then they just panted against each other's mouths, which was well enough because Zoro didn't think he could trust himself to do anything but this. Sanji smelled like smoke, leather, rum, and some underlying scent of _male_. This close, it was so heady Zoro felt more intoxicated by it than the five or so beers he'd had earlier in the evening. He could feel Sanji's cock hard against his stomach every time he pushed close, and that just made it worse.

It wasn't clumsy, but it wasn't exactly patented Adult Fucking either, yet that didn't stop Zoro from coming. His head wilted back against the sofa, his mouth fell open, his spine went stiff and his hips pressed up, fucking himself against Sanji's ass until he was wrung out and drained.

"Upstairs?" he asked after a moment or so. His limbs weren't yet un-jellified, but his mouth still worked fine, and he planned to put it to good use in a few minutes.

"Definitely," Sanji panted back.

Zoro turned off the TV and led him upstairs the moment his faculties were regained. They passed the practice room Zoro kept, tatami illuminated by moonlight coming in from the uncovered windows which also touched on the sword rack, setting the saya agleam.

"You still practice?"

Zoro shrugged. "You don't just stop bothering with what you love."

"Fair enough."

The bedroom was at the far end of the hall on the other side, and Zoro pushed the door open - it was still a mess from earlier, uniform once again carelessly spread over the floor. The still-damp towel was halfway covering his bedside table, and all in all he wasn't actually pleased at showing it to Sanji in this condition.

Luckily Sanji didn't seem to care about anything but getting out of his shirt, pulling his socks off, and unbuttoning his jeans as quickly as possible. Zoro did the same, making a face as his boxers peeled wetly away from his skin, then shoved Sanji to the bed none too gently.

They rolled across the sheets, causing some to spill off the side, and Sanji finally came up on top. He was flushed attractively and panting very quietly, and Zoro had to pause for a moment and just look because Sanji was covered in ink where his shirt had been hiding it before.

Waves wrapped around his left arm, no actual boundary lines, just colors - orangey-red sky, gray swirls of cloud, yellow sun, green-blue waves, black smudge of a ship. It swallowed his whole arm, ending just before his bony wrist. There was the bushy bristle of some kind of tail curled around his waist on the right side, and an angular snout on the other, tall stalks of purple-blue flowers weaving up around the both the snout and the tail on either side.

"You can fuck me," Sanji murmured, rolling to his side so he could shimmy out of his jeans and underwear, using his feet to push them down all the way. He kneed Zoro in the thigh as he climbed back up, and whispered an apology before Zoro could even register the faint pain.

Zoro was silent as he wrapped his fingers loosely around Sanji's cock, hefting him up slightly so he didn't have to reach down so far. He stroked him a couple times before Sanji burrowed his head in against Zoro's neck, nipping at it frantically.

He shuddered in Zoro's arms, pushing his hips up hard into his fist; he trembled all over - Zoro couldn't be sure if it was because he was trying to stop himself from coming, or if he was pushing himself harder toward it.

He abruptly stopped moving his hand, and Sanji let out a low whine, trying to get it going again on his own by forcing his hips up, but Zoro belted an arm around his back and held him down against his chest.

"I'm not gonna fuck you tonight," Zoro whispered behind the shell of his ear. "I'll suck you off and finger you until you come all over yourself, but you'll have to wait for anything more."

Sanji hissed in a breath and rolled quickly off of Zoro. "Well? Get to it."

And Zoro did, working his way down Sanji's body. He pushed his shirt up, nibbled gently at his stomach and hipbones all while Sanji huffed out little laughs and tried to shove at Zoro's head.

He gave in finally and kissed his way from Sanji's belly button, along the trail of darkening golden hair that led down, and took Sanji's hard cock in his mouth in one swift movement.

Sanji groaned loudly and arched off the bed. Zoro hummed, butting his forehead against Sanji's hipbone before pulling back.

"Overreaction much?" he asked, and Sanji draped one leg over his shoulder, kicking him lightly on the back with his heel.

"Shut up. It's been awhile and you're a lot hotter than you were last time I saw you, shitty teasing bastard."

"A lot better at this too since the last time you saw me," he murmured with a smirk on his face, kissing at Sanji's nose as he leaned up to the bedside table, unsteadily grabbing a bottle of lube at random.

"I wouldn't know," Sanji commented drily.

Zoro refrained from telling him that he _could_ have known, if he'd wanted to, and instead went back to his elbows, barely sucking at the tip of Sanji's cock. He had a nice shape, average length but good and thick, and uncut. Zoro sank onto one forearm as he worked his mouth lower, taking him in with something akin to ease.

Despite being relatively good at multi-tasking, it took a lot of fumbling to snap open the bottle of lube and get some on his fingers. Once he had, he couldn't find the bottle to close it again, but forgot about it after Sanji nudged him in the shoulder blade several times, presumably as punishment for being distracted.

He stroked a wet fingertip over Sanji's hole, and he encouraged Zoro wordlessly, so he continued on, pressing it into Sanji patiently. Only he didn't seem to need it slow, and bucked down against Zoro, so he pressed deeper, licked at the vein on the underside of Sanji's cock, and he moaned, seeming pleased by the way his leg went limp over Zoro's shoulder.

At first he didn't really move all that much, just thrust it slightly every time Sanji seemed to be drifting into a plateau of bliss. After a couple minutes, he felt it was alright to try a second, and patted around the sheets for the bottle of lube, wetting his fingers again once he'd found it and going for two. Sanji seemed overwhelmingly approving of it, if the low pleased noise he made was to be believed. He scissored them a couple times, then tried rubbing around, and smirked when Sanji's whole body seized in pleasure. He continued pressing against that spot until Sanji was making constant, desperate noises, seeming unable to figure out whether to shove up into his mouth or down onto his fingers.

In the end, Zoro helped him out by rubbing mercilessly against that spot, and combining that and Zoro's mouth, he started to shake, pulling at Zoro's short hair and whispering, "God, Zoro, fuck, you're gonna make me come."

Zoro pulled his mouth off Sanji's cock, making an obscene wet noise as he did so, but kept shoving his fingers against Sanji's prostate until he moaned, hands clutching the sheets, and came. Just like Zoro'd promised to make him come all over himself, he shot on his stomach and his chest and Zoro couldn't do much more than stare at Sanji's face, contorted in agonized pleasure.

He came down as if in a dream, fingers moving to stroke Zoro's hair gratefully, and Zoro moved up to spoon against him.

"We should clean up," he said against Sanji's neck.

"Mmph. I'm good here." Only he obviously wasn't, since he climbed on top of Zoro and stayed very still there for several minutes.

After a while, his breath was a lot less quick, but it wasn't quite the deep evenness of sleep yet.

"I feel bad about falling asleep on you," he mumbled into the crook of Zoro's neck, dragging himself out of the trance that Zoro had drawn him into using the steady moving of his chest with each respiration and his palm smoothing up and down Sanji's back.

"Don't," Zoro replied, fingers resting against the top of Sanji's bony spine. "I probably won't be going to sleep until you wake up. That's just how my schedule is."

"No, I mean, falling asleep _physically_ on you."

Zoro scoffed, tugging lightly at Sanji's hair. "Don't lie to me. I know you; if you felt bad about it, you wouldn't do it."

"Okay. I don't feel bad about it." Zoro could feel Sanji's lips curl up in a smile against his skin. "Just push me off if you get sick of me. I won't wake up."

"Mm. Alright."

They laid silently for a while until Sanji's breath finally evened out and his body slumped slightly more into Zoro's.

He was comfortable like that for an hour or two; he'd turned on the television, set the volume to low, and let that run in the background so he didn't feel strange for just laying there and holding Sanji.

Around one in the morning, he gently rolled Sanji off of him. True to his word, he didn't awaken, not even when Zoro scrubbed him up with a washcloth.

He cleaned himself up as well, then made his way back downstairs to read for a couple hours.

He'd been so carried off with it that he didn't resurface until around 7, when the steps popped and creaked with the weight of someone walking down them.

Sanji still looked half asleep, but he smiled at Zoro as he wandered into the living room, wearing Zoro's discarded sleep pants. They were big and baggy on him, but Zoro was intensely into the idea of Sanji wearing his clothes.

"Let me make you breakfast," Sanji said, his voice rough from sleep, and Zoro nodded easily. They'd probably known each other long enough and well enough that the morning after wouldn't be overwhelmingly awkward, or change things too much, but he'd worried nonetheless. If it had turned out bad and brought that antagonistic air back, he'd likely have found himself wishing that they just hadn't met again. It was hard enough the first time.

"That'd be nice."

"Alright. Just stay there, if you want. I'll call you when it's done."

"Nah, I'll come keep you company."

They were largely silent in the kitchen together. The first thing Sanji did was get the coffee going in the ancient coffee maker that Zoro rarely used - he was a tea person, himself. He sat mesmerized as Sanji diced up potatoes, onions, green and red peppers, then tossed all of it in a sauté pan with some olive oil, salt, and pepper. After that, he moved on to making homemade pancakes despite the fact that strangely, there was pancake mix in one of the upper cabinets. He ladled out exactly the same amount for each pancake, then set some sausage links to sizzling in the last of the frying pans Zoro owned. With everything going steady, he stepped toward the kitchen window and opened it so that the cold morning breeze filtered in.

Zoro wasn't wearing anything but the throw from the couch, draped over his shoulders like a cloak, but being behind the counter, he found he didn't mind the cool air. Sanji had taken his lighter and pack of cigarettes from his coat which was still hanging over the dining chair, lit one up, and was now leaning over the sink to blow all the smoke out of the window. It gave him a chance to finally see what the tattoo was that wrapped around his sides: stretched lazily across his back in a field of those same purple-blue flowers was a sharply-stylized fox, and a couple crows sitting on a wire strung between the points of his shoulder blades. Oddly, one of them was holding a meat cleaver in its beak.

Zoro was probably delirious with his screwed-up sleeping schedule, because he found himself wishing dearly that the sight of Sanji standing half-naked in his kitchen, smoking and cooking, would be a sight he'd never have to stop seeing.

Sanji didn't have to pay much attention as he cooked, standing sentinel instead; he flipped pancakes when they needed to be flipped, rotated the sausages until they were perfectly crisp, and used a spatula to push the potatoes around, but largely, he smoked and drank coffee in equal measures. Zoro mostly watched him, occasionally taking a sip of his own mug of red rooibos with honey and sugar.

When the sausages were out of the pan, Sanji fried a few eggs, buttered some toast, then laid the pans out on the potholders. Zoro finally realized how hungry he was starting to feel, and piled a plate high with everything.

They said only a few words over breakfast as well - Sanji didn't eat anything except for a couple sausage links and a piece of toast, but Zoro scarfed it all down as if he hadn't eaten in days.

"So good," he groaned, patting his belly. "So fucking good. Can I pay you to stay here and cook for me all day?"

"That all you want me for?" Sanji asked, with a mischievous wink.

Zoro tilted his head, pretending to think seriously for a moment. "Is there anything else you're good at?"

Sanji squawked, and aimed a kick at Zoro's side. He let him land it, rocking on the stool a few times before settling back.

"You seemed to enjoy last night well enough," he said, putting his fork down on his now-empty plate. "Would I really have to pay you to make you come like that as often as you wanted?"

"If you made me come like that as often as I wanted, I would let you do anything you liked," Sanji replied, replacing the smoked-down filter with a new cigarette. "Unfortunately, I have a job and speaking of, I need to be out of here by ten to start getting ready for work."

"That shouldn't be a problem. I'll most likely be in bed by then, there's not much to do around here that'd be any fun for you."

Sanji hummed in acknowledgement as he started rummaging around the cabinets for tupperware containers to store the leftovers in. Once he'd found them, he rinsed up all the pots and pans, put them in the dishwasher, and stuck the containers in the fridge for later. By the time he was done, Zoro had almost cleaned out his second plate.

"Do you mind if I use the practice room for my morning routine?" Sanji asked, putting out his last cigarette and tossing it in the trash can.

"Go ahead. Mats are folded up in the closet."

"Thanks."

Zoro nodded noncommittally, and went back to his breakfast. He dumped the plate in the sink when he was done, nowhere near as good about clearing up after himself as Sanji was, and took the stairs up.

Sanji was bent in goddamn half as he passed by the practice room, and he wasn't wearing anything but his blue boxer briefs as he did so. Zoro had to pull himself up short and gape in through the open door. From bent in half, he moved to lunges, then a standing split, and finally a backbend. It was mesmerizing.

Sadly, he had to walk right by that room, but he wouldn't make himself stay away for long. As soon as he'd dressed in loose sweats, he went back to the practice room and began to go through his own katas.

It was his usual routine to burn out all of his energy before going to bed, but with Sanji so close to him, it felt entirely different. They moved in counterpoint but there was still a strange harmony in the room; when Zoro knelt, drew, and lunged forward, Sanji was stretching out each long leg - quads, hamstrings, then inner thighs.

"Koshiro's not here..." Sanji started a couple minutes later, and Zoro sheathed Shusui before turning to look at him.

"Yeah, so?"

"So we could actually fight."

Zoro was wary from the instant Sanji suggested it. For one thing, he couldn't see that Sanji had any actual ability, and for another, he was a _lot_ more frightening with swords than he used to be - and Sanji wasn't wearing anything to keep him safe.

Sanji had slipped on the pair of geta Zoro kept in the practice room in the meantime, and Zoro had to smirk at the image he made: sleep disheveled, wearing nothing but boxer briefs and a pair of sandals, bare-chested and bare-legged. Still, he moved forward with grace, right foot first, and Zoro drew Shusui again, meeting him halfway.

It wasn't like he was _intentionally_ drawing the blows, or slowing them, or just generally degrading his ability by more than half, but his subconscious seemed to be incredibly paranoid about hurting Sanji.

Sanji, whose foot came up, blocking the swing easily right between the teeth of the geta. Shusui made a distinct _clack_ and Sanji frowned at him. The next swing was just as slow and Sanji was starting to look equal parts bored and pissed off as he halted it quickly.

"Stop going easy on me, bastard."

It was a lot like kissing him, really. Within minutes, Sanji had drawn his power out, making him _work_ for it like he'd never had to before. Even when he was moving at his quickest, Sanji was right there, forcing the blade back with the geta's base. Even when he was swinging his hardest, Sanji didn't back down, knocking him off course with each well-aimed kick.

And when he got bored of blocking... it was like watching a whirlwind. He kicked off the geta, dodged using his body, and got right up through Zoro's defenses with each kick like a whip. His feet landed hard in all of Zoro's unprotected areas, one to the kidney, one to the left shoulder, one to the knee.

They were both breathing hard a couple minutes in, but they were just getting warmed up. Zoro got a hit in with the back edge of Shusui, but that just made Sanji guard even harder.

"Get another," Sanji panted as he stepped back. Zoro took Sandai Kitetsu from the rack next, unsheathed it quickly, and then Sanji was on him again.

Zoro blocked easier this way, but found himself doing more of that than actually attacking, so when he saw his chance, he took it. He dropped both swords, grabbed Sanji's right leg around the thigh as it was mid-kick, and pushed him off his feet.

Sanji went down, wind knocked hard out of him and frowning. "That's... not fair," he gasped. Zoro smirked, grabbed up each sword and sheathed them, then went to his knees, squeezing them around Sanji's hips.

"Who taught you all that shit?"

Rolling his eyes, Sanji took a handful of Zoro's ass and forced him to move against his hardening cock. "The old man was a professional savateur back in France before we moved to the US, before he even started his first restaurant. He taught me."

Zoro nodded, placing his palms on either side of Sanji's head, working in slight hitches against him. "Seems like it's working out well for you."

With a jolt, Zoro was on his back. Sanji had wormed one of his flexible legs under Zoro's arm, around his chest, and knocked him flat off. In the next second, Sanji was on him, pulling his sweatpants halfway down his thighs, mouth hot and wet on his cock. Zoro hummed, pleased, and shifted up to his elbows to get a better look.

The morning sun was streaming through the window, catching just right in Sanji's hair so that the strands looked more like silken gold. It caressed his naked back, shaping out the muscles, the gentle curve of his spine where it met his ass, lit up the fox and the crows, threw his shadow into a perfect silhouette of something feral and ravenous. He couldn't think of anything he'd rather be looking at right now.

He could think of things he'd rather be paying attention to though - the lick of pleasure down his spine every time Sanji drew back slightly and bumped the vein on the underside of his cock with his bottom lip, the saliva making everything too slick to catch even a hint of friction, the sweet, concentrated face Sanji was making, eyes shut, brows drawn.

Zoro rested on one elbow and reached down to card a hand through Sanji's soft hair. His eyes flew open immediately and he looked up at Zoro as if he'd woken from a dream, completely unaware of anything that was happening around him. Then his eyes narrowed and he slowly pushed down, the hot clutch of his throat closing around Zoro's cock and making his head fall back, a choked moan escaping him.

Sanji worked him over until he was panting and almost begging his body to just _let go_ , and when he did, it was so powerful his back and shoulders came clean off the mat. He shuddered and came in long pulses down Sanji's throat, then dropped back supine.

"Come up here and let me help you out," he grunted after a moment of blinking away the lights swimming behind his eyelids.

"No need," Sanji said, holding up his hand, splashed with come.

Zoro laughed, shaking his head in disbelief.

"I left a little on the mat for you too. Something to remember me by!" he said, jumping up and running back for the bedroom before Zoro could even understand what was happening.

He paused to clean it up, then trailed after Sanji. The master bath's door was halfway ajar, steam starting to drift out, so Zoro slipped in. He tossed his sweatpants off at random, and at the sound of them dropping, Sanji poked his drenched head out of the shower.

"Get in here already."

Zoro did as told, and they proceeded to take a shower as free of gropings as either of them could manage, which was to say not very. After toweling off and a glance at the clock, Sanji was determined to get himself put together as quickly as possible while sneaking in kisses at the same time.

"I really have to go," he said, breaking off a fierce, biting kiss.

"Fucking go then," Zoro huffed as Sanji tried to descend for another. "Stop kissing! Put your damn clothes on and get out of my house!"

Sanji beamed at him brightly and smacked a kiss on Zoro's damp hair.

"Gonna arrest me for trespassing?" he asked with a wink.

"If you don't get, I'm gonna handcuff you to my bed and you won't be leaving until I'm satisfied that you've _suffered_ enough for my liking."

"Ooh, sounds lovely."

"GET!" Zoro yelled with a swipe at Sanji's face.

Sanji darted out of the way and finally pulled on his jeans and button-up, balling up his boxer briefs and socks to take downstairs. He'd borrowed a pair of socks from Zoro, but claimed to not be bothered with going commando until he got back home.

They made their way downstairs, picking up Sanji's stuff in the kitchen, and it was precisely 9:58 by the time they were standing at the door saying goodbye.

"Text me today. I don't have to go in until 1, but I've gotta do laundry and all that bullshit in the meantime. I'll be bored."

Zoro rolled his eyes. "Okay."

"I mean it!"

"Yeah, got it!"

"Text me now to prove you mean it," Sanji sing-songed.

God, Sanji had grown up to be even pushier than he used to be. He took out his phone.

' _go away_ ' he typed, and Sanji pulled out his phone to check it, smiling at Zoro.

"I'm just fucking with you. But seriously... I had a good time last night and this morning. Don't disappear on me again. It was bad enough the first time."

"Me too," Zoro muttered, wiping at the faint stain of red on his cheeks. The fact that Sanji was echoing his own sentiment filled him with warmth. "It was really good."

"Okay, I'm out," Sanji said, and kissed Zoro a few more times for good measure.

When he was gone, Zoro walked slowly up the stairs, plopped into bed, and drifted off to sleep.

He hoped like hell that when he woke up, this would still seem so good.


	2. The Reflection of You

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A day early because early’s always fun, right? I feel like it’s fair to warn you guys, for a pretty decent amount of time this fic is mostly a feel-good slice of life type deal. The drama doesn’t kick in until much later, but it does happen. You might say it’s the fluff before the storm.
> 
> Chapter title from the song of the same name by Bear in Heaven.

It snowed Thursday night. By the time he went to bed, what was left of it was already somewhat dirty and slushy, but Zoro found satisfaction in the contrast of how cold it was out there and how warm it was inside, especially after crawling under the heap of blankets on his bed with his phone.

' _i want to see you again_ ' he typed out, then backspaced it. Not really needy, but not specific enough, either. ' _you should come over sometime_ ' he typed. Deleted. It sounded like the kind of thing two people who were previously friends felt obligated to say after a one night stand, as if to convey that yeah, things could go back to normal. ' _i'd like to take you to dinner_.' Deleted. It sounded stuffy and kind of creepy to him. Like the sort of thing a sugar daddy would say. And they were kind of past proper courting at this point.

He grimaced and dropped his phone, smashing his face into the pillow. They were all things he _wanted_ to say, if only he could word them right, but they weren't things that he felt he could or should say. He'd officially reached the point where it became apparent why he never slept with people without knowing what they wanted out of it.

They'd been texting back and forth whenever they got the chance. After Sanji had left the previous morning, and after Zoro had slept, he'd had a quick dinner of leftovers from breakfast, then sat down for a couple rounds on the XBox before work.

' _did you know there are people who become physically ill at the sight of flan when it jiggles?_ 'came a text when he was completely immersed in smashing up demons. He made a frustrated noise, paused, and dropped the controller to pick up his phone.

As he read, he let out a soft, singular bark of a laugh, then typed a reply. ' _i was in fact not aware of that._ '

' _i'm covered in vomit right now._ '

' _that's sexy as hell, i know what i'll be thinking of next time i jerk off._ ' And suddenly he really hoped that the joking tone came through in text. Awkward conversations about less than savory fetishes were something he'd had plenty of in his life - he didn't need more, especially not ones caused by misunderstandings that could be avoided by a fully-functioning sarcasm meter.

Radio silence for a few minutes (embarrassment pushing up further and further in Zoro's gut) then Sanji texted him a picture of his pristine white chef's jacket with a dark smear down the front.

' _thanks, i'm so glad i got to see that. because the mental image wasn't enough_ ' Zoro replied.

' _oh, you know, i wanted to send you something nice to look at when you're rubbing one out ;)_ '

' _pretty sure that's not the part of the picture i'm going to be looking at when the need arises._ '

' _suit yourself! gotta get back to work. our rotisseur is out of commission thanks to that whole debacle. i'll text you later._ '

' _sure, behave yourself. don't make anymore people throw up._ '

' _it wasn't my fault!_ '

Zoro chuckled and put his phone back down. He'd sat and finished a couple more levels, then had reluctantly gotten ready for work, prepared to have to deal with chaos there.

But it was wonderfully quiet for a change, almost to the point of making him paranoid. He got through his reports, shot the shit with Tashigi for an hour or two under the guise of comparing notes, managed to see as little of Lieutenant Smoker as possible, and got another text from Sanji promising homemade daifuku next time they saw each other.

So yeah, there was a bit of back and forth flirting and provoking, idle promises made, but that could mean literally anything. Zoro knew that he was emotionally invested, but Sanji might not be. In fact, it was more likely that he _wasn't_.

On Friday night, he and Ace ended up back at the Baratie for dinner. They were seated at the back beside the kitchen again, despite how crowded it was with people - nearly every other table was filled, and not by anyone dressed in their street clothes like Zoro and Ace were. No, these were people who probably wore $2,000 suits to sleep in and couture gowns to the pool. These were people who barely batted an eyelash at dropping three hundred bucks on lunch alone.

Nami's older sister Nojiko was dressed in a neat black suit with a white tie, tattoos covered but purple-blue hair laying in perfect curls as she approached their table. She had a demure look on her face until she realized just who she was looking at - then it transformed into the kind of expression that Zoro was more used to seeing on her: soft, doe eyes contrasted with a cunning, playful mouth. They didn't know each other all that well, but he'd seen enough of her when he was hanging around Nami to find her agreeable, if a bit of a troublemaker when it came to guys. In most ways but that, she was the complete opposite of her mother and her sister.

"What are you up to over here?" she asked, not unkindly. "Not exactly your whole scene."

Zoro was about to speak when Ace interrupted him. "He's here to see Sanji!" Zoro pinned him with an annoyed look, and Ace had the audacity to grin even wider.

Nojiko raised an eyebrow but didn't question it. "Right... What'll you have for starters?"

"A bottle of Stella," said Zoro.

"Same," said Ace. "And lemon squash dip."

"Sure!" she chirped, and headed for the kitchen.

"Sooo," Ace said.

Zoro hummed, waiting for him to spit it out.

"SOOO!"

" _What_."

" _Sooo_ , did you text Sanji?"

"Fucking nosy, aren't you?" Sanji inquired from behind Ace. He wasn't wearing his chef's jacket, instead dressed in black slacks and a short-sleeved marigold-colored button-up that exposed his tattoos. He had on glasses, too. It was very pleasing to look upon, in Zoro's opinion.

"Yeah. I wanna know," said Ace, turning his curious gaze away from Zoro and to Sanji as he came around.

Sanji nudged his hip against Zoro until he got the idea, scooting further into the booth to make space for him to sit down. In reward, Sanji placed a quick peck on Zoro's lips.

"Now you know," Sanji said, pleased look on his face. He dragged Zoro's discarded menu over in front of himself, and when Nojiko returned with drinks and a bowl of dip nestled amongst pita chips, he asked for a beer as well.

They went ahead and ordered actual food while they were at it - Ace got goulash, Sanji went for some kind of pasta with seafood and pesto, then suggested Zoro try the pork chops when he started making the face of indecision.

"The old man makes them," he tempted. "They're really good."

"Pork chops," Zoro said to Nojiko, and went back to his beer after sequestering a few pita chips.

" _Interesting_ ," said Ace. " _Very interesting_."

"You'll keep your interest to yourself if you want my foot to stay out of your ass," Sanji said, thwapping Ace in the arm with his knife.

Zoro smirked to himself. It was interesting to see this quick-tempered, sharp-tongued side of Sanji directed at someone that wasn't him.

"And what the hell are you looking so pleased about?" Sanji asked him, eyes narrowed.

"Not a thing in the world," replied Zoro. He'd dropped his right hand in the meantime, resting it on Sanji's warm thigh. He didn't even push it off. Zoro took it as a victory.

"Y'know, I said there was no time like the present but I didn't mean you had to seduce him in a day," Ace mused.

" _Who said he seduced me_ ," inquired Sanji darkly, glasses flashing in the light as he looked threateningly upon Ace.

"Why else are you both acting like that then?" Ace countered with a glare of his own.

"I'd love to see a scruffy-looking mannerless bastard like this seduce anybody!" Sanji said in mock outrage.

"Speaking of scruffy-looking, what the hell's up with what you're wearing, anyway? Gonna roll your cigarettes up in your sleeve next, you fucking hipster?" Zoro asked, jumping easily into their cruel banter.

"I wouldn't expect a gorilla like you to have any idea what fashion looks like, moss-for-brains!"

Zoro chuckled and kicked Sanji's foot lightly. "Just remember, you're 27 years old, you'll have to find a new shitty bandwagon to jump on in a couple years."

Sanji harrumphed and Zoro took the moment to snatch the glasses off of him and put them on himself.

"What the fuck, are you _blind_?" he asked, startled as the world before him blurred into a mass of color and light.

When Sanji had whipped them off and replaced them on his own face, Zoro could see that he was blushing faintly.

"I'm not _blind_ , I just need corrections!"

"Hmm... why didn't you wear them the other night?" he asked.

" _The other night?_ " Ace hissed in a high voice.

"I usually wear contacts, I just didn't have time to put them in today."

Zoro grunted and squeezed Sanji's thigh tightly. He didn't know if this mildly defensive behavior of Sanji's was because of Ace's presence or if the kindness of the past few days had been a blip of getting along in a long, continuing line of hostility.

However, before he could start convincing himself that they might not be able to make peace with their differences, Nojiko was back with a beer for Sanji. He took several gulps to catch up with Zoro and Ace, adam's apple bobbing steadily in his long, elegant throat. "Since we're already on the topic of people who don't know how to just make a move, how goes the wooing of the cigar guy?" he finally asked once he'd drained half the bottle.

"Cigar guy?" inquired Zoro curiously. There was only one person he knew who smoked cigars and that was... Smoker.

"He's never going to crack," Ace said, obviously avoiding Zoro's question. "I'm not bothered by it."

"That's a shame. It sounded like you were pretty into him."

"Takes two to tango, I guess."

"It takes one to have a crush, doesn't matter if it's reasonable or not," Sanji said fervently, leaning further over the table so as to show Ace his sincerity.

" _What cigar guy_?" Zoro asked, clutching his beer bottle hard enough that the glass squeaked against his fingertips.

"Smoker? Was that his name?" Sanji asked innocently, drawing back.

Ace's face drained of color at the same exact time as Zoro's did.

"You're trying to woo my _boss_?" Zoro burst out, voice raised but not to the point of shouting.

"It's not like that!" Ace cried. "I'm just... interested in him, I guess."

"Ugh. Your fucking loss," Zoro said as he shook his head in mild horror.

"Your boss?" Sanji asked curiously.

"Yeah. He's a total hardass. I've never even seen him crack a smile."

Sanji made a soft considering noise, tracing his index finger through the condensation on the outside of his beer bottle. "Yeah, but do you ever see him outside of work?"

"Nah. He works all the time," Zoro said after a moment of genuinely having to _think_ about whether he had or not.

"Maybe he's different when he's off duty."

Dubiously, Zoro shook his head. While that was true of a lot of officers, Smoker was always so single-minded it was hard to imagine him being any other way. "I really don't think so."

They were interrupted again by Nojiko coming back with plates, and they dug in with haste.

"I think he's got potential though," Ace said after he'd had a few spoonfuls of his goulash. Like his brother, he had a tendency to talk with his mouth full, despite being rather more mannered than Luffy at any other time.

"It's your life," Zoro admitted at long last, pausing to lick a succulent droplet of marinade from his fork. "I'm not going to tell you what to do, but if you make dealing with him any worse than it already is, I'll kick your ass."

"I'm not that serious about it anyway. I doubt I'm his type."

"You'd only be his type if you were a piece of paper that listed every gang member in the city and their home address," Zoro replied.

"You should just go for it," Sanji finally put in. "If he's interested, great. If he's not, you tried and you know, so you can move on."

Ace said nothing, so they let it drop.

Sanji had only just cleared his plate before he stood and placed his napkin back on the table. "Gotta get back to work, break's over," he bemoaned, and leaned down to place a kiss on Zoro's mouth.

"Wait, you owe me daifuku. You promised," Zoro said, grabbing him by a belt loop.

"This weekend, okay? I wasn't expecting to see you today, or else I'd have brought it. Come over and I'll make dinner for you."

"Yeah, okay."

"Can I come over for dinner too?" Ace asked, putting on his best begging face.

"No," they both said at the same time.

"Be that way, then," he whined, pouting ever so slightly.

Sanji gave Zoro one more kiss before he waved goodbye and was back to the kitchen.

"Well that's definitely interesting," Ace said after a couple moments, back to normal. They'd sent their suspiciously small bill off with Nojiko and were waiting at the table, draining the last of their beers.

"What's that?"

"He seems to be pretty into you."

"Yeah, it's something," Zoro let out on a sigh.

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"I dunno. We just never got along at all when we were younger. Sometimes we'd fight so bad his dad and mine would have to physically carry us to other ends of the house and lock us in to keep us separated. It's just a little weird, that's all."

"I don't think it's weird that he slept with you. He does have a lot of one night stands... I met him four years ago, I think? Way before I met you. Anyway, he's been with plenty of girls and guys since then. It's weird that _you_ slept with _him_. I mean, you've been in two relationships since I met you, both of them long-term. And it's also weird that he doesn't seem like he wants to get rid of you. As much as he likes to fall for people, he gets over them really, really quickly. I still don't think it's completely unexpected, though."

Zoro suddenly realized that Ace had actually known Sanji in his early twenties. It was strange to think that he might know Sanji even better than Zoro did now, despite Zoro knowing him longer.

"I dunno. He's done a lot of maturing since I met him. Maybe he's starting to want to settle down," Ace continued after a couple seconds of letting it all sink in.

Zoro scoffed. "We just hung out and then... you know, fooled around some. We didn't propose to each other or anything."

"Just see how it goes! It could be good for both of you."

Zoro didn't say that he'd already been _planning_ on seeing how it would go. Somewhere along the way, his heart seemed to have forgotten to fall out of love with the kid he'd known and left behind.

* * *

Zoro's sleeping schedule normalized a little on off days, and Smoker had told him to take one more for how overworked he'd been, so he found himself going to bed at midnight and waking up at eight for a change on Saturday. Half an hour into his extra thirty minutes of just laying in bed and relaxing, Sanji texted him.

' _tonight! come over around 5:30. don't bother to bring anything, i've got matching booze._ '

' _i'll be there_ ' he replied.

He spent the day mostly waffling around, tidying up the detritus of the week. He did some laundry, finally got his uniform cleaned, ran to the grocery store to get a couple necessities, then came back and took an extra-long shower. He bothered to shave off the stubble he'd accumulated over his couple days off, and put on some of the fancy custom cologne that Robin had gotten for him for his birthday.

When it came time to pick something to wear though, all the air in his sails deflated. He generally wasn't good at dressing himself in any kind of _adult_ fashion. In fact, he was still stuck dressing like the damn punk he was as a teenager.

In the end, he decided on a baggy black and green striped sweater, a pair of jeans that had seen much better days (ripped all to hell, but not stained at least) which fit pretty well, and a newish pair of combat boots that weren't yet scuffed up.

He figured it looked okay. Then he realized he was going to dinner at a hipster's place, and it might even be construed as somewhat _attractive_ by said hipster. Most everyone he'd ever had a romantic interest in had made faces at his somewhat outdated style, so this was going to be a first.

The temperature outside was flip-flopping between twenty and ten degrees, but he bundled up in his bomber jacket, put a beanie and scarf on, and kept his hands stuffed down his pockets for the walk to the subway.

Half an hour later, he was taking the elevator up to the twelfth floor of Sanji's apartment building. It almost made him uneasy how clean and white and blank the whole place was, and he couldn't tell if the severe-looking woman who stepped into the elevator as he was getting off was glaring at him, or if that was just the way her eyebrows were drawn on.

He knocked on the door to number 23 absently. It opened with nary a sound a couple seconds later, and Sanji stood in front of him looking kind of lovely. His hair was pushed back away from his face for once, glasses on, and he was wearing a white and blue cardigan with a plain white t-shirt underneath along with jeans that were very similar to the ones he'd worn to Zoro's the other night, except these ones were gray. And on his feet were... fuzzy yellow slippers. Zoro forced himself not to even let his lips twitch in a smirk.

"Hey, right on time. I just finished putting it all out." He motioned Zoro inside, then leaned in for a kiss as soon as the door shut. His glasses bumped against the bridge of Zoro's nose, but they eventually made it work with a little bit of creative positioning.

When they pulled back, Sanji's nose was wrinkled slightly. "Your nose is cold," he whispered.

"It's cold outside," Zoro whispered back.

"Come in and warm up."

"Okay. Why are we whispering?"

"I don't know. Come on." Sanji led him down the short hallway, which opened into a very modern living room, and beyond that, the kitchen and the dining room.

The kitchen was entirely comprised of stainless steel, granite surfaces, and blindingly white cabinetry. There were all kinds of appliances littering the countertops which Zoro couldn't even begin to imagine the functions of. His cooking knowledge only extended as far as how to make basic meals which would serve him for weeks, so he didn't use much more than the pots and pans he had. The same obviously couldn't be said for Sanji.

Beyond that, the dining room had large windows which would probably let the light pour in if it were daytime, and a large dinner table. Some plants hung in the corner, and on the table was a small spread that had been dished up very artfully.

"Kitsune udon, rice, and grilled fish. I had to look up how to make the udon, so hopefully it isn't too bad."

They sat down together, and Sanji gestured to the ceramic jug slightly to the right of Zoro's seat. "Sake," he said, "go ahead."

Zoro did, pouring first for Sanji and then for himself. The jug was still slightly heated from the warm sake inside, and Zoro had to smile a little. "I'm surprised you remember all of these traditions."

Sanji shrugged, taking a sip. "Your dad did all this stuff without fail. Zeff was really interested in assimilating to accommodate him, I guess it's just stuck on me from growing up around it."

He appreciated it, for some reason. It was nice to not have to explain why he did certain things, even better to have them done _for_ him without asking. "Thanks for the meal," he murmured before slicing off a piece of tofu with his chopsticks, gathering up a noodle or two at the same time.

The first bite was wonderfully warming and savory. He'd never particularly been a tofu person, more keen on meat, but you could bet anything Sanji or Zeff made was going to be something he'd love.

"Amazing," he said after an obligatory bite of rice. Sanji grinned, that same one that was bashful but pleased, and finally started eating his own portion.

For once, they managed to do more talking than eating and drinking. Sanji liked to talk about his co-workers and restaurants that were opening or closing in the city, and though Zoro didn't really have much to talk about (his life hadn't had much of a social aspect to it for quite a while what with this godforsaken case) it was nice to listen to Sanji, and to interject where he felt he could.

"So listen," Sanji said awkwardly, while Zoro was finishing off the rest of his rice. Sanji still had a quarter of his meal left to eat, but his cheeks were flushed from the alcohol Zoro kept serving him every time his cup emptied. "About the other night..."

Zoro tensed, immediately preparing himself for the worst. Sanji had said he'd had a good time, but was that just the politeness of his people person side talking? Had Zoro done something wrong or, heaven forbid, scarred Sanji for life? He knew it sounded entirely unreasonable, even inside his own head, and cursed himself. If he hadn't carried this torch for so many years, he knew he wouldn't give a shit what Sanji was about to say.

"I'm..." Sanji continued, fidgeting with his chopsticks. "Really interested in doing it again? I'd like to see you more? God, how the fuck do adults say they'd like a relationship?" He was laughing at himself self-deprecatingly now, and Zoro's heart squeezed a little in his chest, half relief, half fondness. "I've never actually had to do this before. Relationships aren't generally my thing, but I kind of want to try with you? Say something so I can stop sounding stupid."

"I'd really like that a lot," Zoro said, helplessly smiling at him.

"Okay," said Sanji, relief washing over his face as he smiled back at Zoro. "Good."

With that, he seemed to have cleared his mind enough to finish eating, and by the time Zoro had drained his cup of sake and divided the last of what was in the jug equally between them, Sanji was stacking the dishes together to wash them.

"Do you want dessert now, or do you want to wait?" he asked. He'd stood up and started to balance all the bowls and plates in one hand with surprising grace and stability for somebody who'd had so much alcohol, and Zoro stood too to bring over the empty sake jug and his own cup, which he'd tossed back in a single mouthful.

"I can wait," he replied, standing patiently behind Sanji while he started to fill the sink.

"Alright. This stuff has to be hand-washed, so if you want to go sit down and watch TV or something..."

"I'll help you." He shifted from one foot to the other, and finally placed the drinkware onto the counter beside the sink.

"Aw, somebody to dry my dishes for me? I can already see what a good boyfriend you're going to be," Sanji said, turning his head to give Zoro a wink.

 _Boyfriend_. The word made Zoro's heart soar. If he were still sixteen years old, he'd probably have died of happiness. The things he would have done to be Sanji's boyfriend twelve years ago were nothing to be taken lightly.

Still, he couldn't help but to correct Sanji. "I did the same exact thing with you almost every single night from the time I was nine until when we moved away."

"But now there's sexual tension," Sanji said. "That's what makes all the difference."

 _Trust me, there was plenty of one-sided sexual tension going on after you hit puberty_ , Zoro thought to himself. "Sexual tension makes dish-drying fun to you?"

"Sure. Gives you something to look forward to afterward."

"What makes you think I'm gonna wanna tumble some clammy wrinkle-handed hipster?"

Sanji scoffed as he dumped dish soap into the water and took up a sponge. "Please. You act like you weren't totally obvious in checking out my ass a couple minutes ago."

Zoro shrugged helplessly, because it was true. "So domesticity is foreplay for you. I'll have to remember that."

Sanji made a soft noise of rebuttal. "I dunno. The _idea_ of domesticity is very sexually appealing in my mind, but I've never given it a try."

Zoro hummed in response as he took the first bowl from Sanji and expertly enfolded it in the dish towel, rubbing all the water off until it squeaked.

Sanji managed to drop a couple dishes back in the water as he went to hand them off to Zoro, and finally he laughed softly and leaned his arms on the lip of the sink. "I think I'm a little more drunk than I thought I was."

"I don't mind," Zoro replied, fishing the last plate back out of the sink. "Go sit down if you want to, I can finish up."

"Okay. I'll try to sober up some and then we'll have dessert."

Zoro nodded, plucked out the sake cups and dried them gently, then patted the outside of the jug before standing it bottom up in the dish drainer. When he was done, he dried his hands, wiped up the droplets of water that had fallen on the counter, and tucked the dish towel back onto the stove handle.

Sanji seemed to have disappeared, but then as he walked into the living room, he noticed the glow of a cigarette beyond the window. He opened the door to the balcony, and there was Sanji sitting on an ice-blanketed chair, elbow resting on a small round table. He was tapping ash into an equally ice-filled ashtray, and as Zoro stepped out into the chill, he looked up and smiled.

"My butt's wet."

"Hot."

"Kinda cold, actually."

"Maybe you shouldn't have sat in the ice, loser."

"I didn't trust myself to stand up."

Zoro sighed, a note of fondness coloring it.

They stayed out long enough for Sanji to smoke one more cigarette, and Zoro was even shivering a little by the end of it. Sanji, at least, had the good sense to put on a coat.

"Okay, dessert now," Sanji said, standing and brushing the clinging ice off his butt. Zoro was startled into a somewhat rude laugh by the giant wet spot covering the seat of his pants.

"Dry pants first, maybe," he suggested.

Sanji made a sudden attempt to turn his upper body around enough to look at his back, which was somewhat disturbing when he actually managed. "Good idea, I guess."

He went ahead, leaving through the other archway in the living room. Zoro took the time to look around himself. What at first had seemed too modern and clean to contain any personality quickly resolved itself to be the opposite. The couch was a minty blue-green with a fuzzy bright pink throw on the back; on the steel and glass coffee table were several books, only a few being cookbooks, and a couple issues of Dazed & Confused and Vogue Hommes. There was a coffee table book of Annie Leibovitz's photography, a stack of Anthony Bourdain's books, and two bookmarked novels - _The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao_ and _Kafka on the Shore_.

It was quaint to think about Sanji reading in his spare time. He smiled briefly as he continued to look around the room.

An enormous entertainment center seemed to take up most of one of the walls. It contained a TV, of course, plenty big but not obsessively large, and a stereo system with a couple shelves full of CDs - mostly jazz, soul, and blues, with a handful of French singers thrown in. The DVDs were probably in the cabinet part of the entertainment center, but he didn't bother to look. His attention had been taken by the photographs littering all the free spaces.

Several of them were of Sanji and Zeff throughout the years. Furthest to the left was one of Sanji when he was just a toddler, a significantly younger-looking Zeff holding him up so he could stir something in a large pot. Zoro thought it was probably taken when they still lived in France, because the room in the background looked nothing like their home in Maryland. Another was Sanji at their elementary school graduation, holding Zeff's hand. A distinctly green head could be seen in the background, and Zoro chuckled as he remembered that day. They'd both been fighting so hard Zeff and Koshiro had threatened to not let them go at all, and Zeff warned them that they'd never get to finish school. They'd abruptly settled, and hadn't fought for half a week out of sheer fear. There was a picture of Sanji at what Zoro assumed was his high school graduation, Zeff standing proud slightly behind him. The last was of him in a chef's jacket and toque with the Le Cordon Bleu insignia, blue ribbon and medal around his neck, Zeff dressed exactly the same in his own uniform from decades prior, which was somewhat ill-fitting by that point.

The largest amount were of Sanji and his friends. Ace, Sanji, Luffy, and a blond, curly haired kid, all of them with their arms slung over each other's shoulders. Sanji, Nami, and Nojiko sitting on someone's couch drinking wine. Robin, her head rested in Franky's lap, feet in Sanji's as she read. Sanji, obviously more than a little bit drunk, arm in arm dancing with Brook. Usopp and Kaya looking adoringly at each other to one side of the frame while the other showed Chopper, wide-eyed as Sanji presented him with an enormous birthday cake. The last on the shelf was of chefs and wait staff that Zoro didn't know all lined up and smiling. He assumed they were the crew of the Baratie, considering Nojiko, Vivi, and Zeff were among them.

And most surprising of all... there were pictures of Zoro. A few of them even had Kuina or Koshiro, as well. All those rare moments where they at least tolerated each other, captured on film and sitting in front of his eyes.

The first one was of he, Sanji, and Kuina, none of them older than ten, sitting on the back porch of Koshiro's home, each with a huge slab of watermelon in their hands. Then it was a seven year old Kuina sitting on one side of Koshiro while he held a toddling Sanji, and Zoro at five years old. Sanji was holding Zoro's fingers tightly, refusing to let go, and Zoro had a suspiciously soft, kind look about his face. Next, one of Kuina and Zoro, fourteen and twelve respectively, standing seriously in their kendo uniforms, each with a bokken in hand. And then there was a picture of Zoro holding Sanji's hand comfortingly on Sanji's first day of kindergarten.

The photographs became less and less as they went up through the years. There were barely any of them once they were teenagers; Zoro counted only two. One was of Kuina looking regal and proud as ever, with Sanji and Zoro on either side of her. Both of them looked hostile, and only just fitting inside of the frame was Sanji's leg reached over to kick Zoro in the calf.

What caught his eye, though, was the last one.

_Sanji had sworn that he wasn't crying, but his eyes were distinctly sheened with wetness. That was alright, because Zoro's were too._

_The date of their departure had approached much more quickly than anyone had anticipated. July 24th. That had given he and Sanji a month and a half of whole days at a time spent together. Zoro would be treasuring those days forever, but he knew it wouldn't ever seem like enough._

_Now the moving van had been packed up, their car was full, and Kuina and their dad were waiting for him._

_He was utterly surprised when Sanji reached up on his tiptoes and wrapped his arms around Zoro's neck. "I'm going to miss you," he whispered. "Promise to call. Maybe sometime we'll be able to visit each other, it's only four hours."_

_Zoro took a deep breath in and smothered his face in Sanji's hair, arms wrapped around his rib cage tightly. "I promise."_

" _Okay, good." But he hadn't let go, and Zoro found that he didn't mind. His ears were deaf to anything that wasn't Sanji's words. His sense of touch couldn't feel anything that wasn't Sanji's warmth and his soft skin. His nose was buried so deep in Sanji's hair that he doubted he'd smell anything but citrus again. And he'd closed his eyes so he didn't have to see anything. This way he could sear Sanji's face onto his mind._

" _I'll miss you too. I guess in a weird way, you were always my best friend," Zoro whispered._

" _Fuck, I really wish you wouldn't talk like we're never going to see each other again."_

" _We will."_

" _If we don't, just promise you won't forget about me, okay?"_

" _We will," Zoro said fiercely. "I swear to fuck we will. If I have to steal a goddamn car or hijack a plane."_

_Sanji laughed, then sniffed quietly, trying to hide the fact that he was crying. "That's pretty awful."_

_Zoro thought about never getting to see Sanji again, and knew that nothing could compare to how awful that was._

" _Okay, I better go," he said, then kissed Sanji's hair gently and prayed he wouldn't say anything about it._

" _Yeah," Sanji said, letting go reluctantly. "See ya."_

" _Bye," Zoro replied lamely, waving as he walked backward toward the car._

_And Sanji waved too, the whole way, until Zoro's eyes blurred too much to see anything, and he closed them instead._

"Sorry, I couldn't find - oh," Sanji said as he entered the room, slowly realizing what Zoro was looking at.

Zoro looked up, somewhat embarrassed to be caught, and quickly put down the framed photograph - that hug, so fucking tight and intimate from the outside, faces buried in each other.

"That's a good one," Sanji said, smiling softly. "I used to get sad whenever I looked at it, but this year I finally felt like it was time to put out all the ones of you guys instead of keeping them in albums. It was a good decision."

"Why did you still have those?" Zoro asked, not offended, just curious.

Sanji shrugged expansively and pushed his glasses back up his nose. "Just because you guys moved away didn't mean you stopped being important to me, or that I forgot about you. I guess I kept all of them _because_ I didn't want to forget you, or ever stop thinking about how big a part of my life you've been. Besides, we promised each other that we wouldn't forget."

Zoro had to fight himself to keep from spilling everything out. _Did you know how much I loved you? Did you know how much it killed me to be away from you? Did you know that it felt like every inch of good emotion was sucked out of me when you told me you were moving back to France, and how it was even worse when you didn't write like you said you would? How suddenly you'd as good as dropped off the face of the planet? And I had no choice but to think that I'd broken the promise I made to you over something so stupid?_

He won over his internal monologue, just barely.

"I thought about you all the time," Zoro said instead, knowing perfectly well just how loaded it sounded. Sanji could probably guess what he meant. "Less as the years went by, and I stopped hoping so much, but... I didn't ever forget you."

Sanji's jaw was tight and his eyes looked sad, but he said nothing.

"It's alright now," Zoro finally sighed. "Sorry for making this heavy."

"Someday... can we talk about it? Not now. I'm too drunk. But someday, will you tell me about it?"

"Yeah," Zoro replied on a gust of breath, relieved as the tense moment broke.

Sanji smiled hesitantly. Zoro finally noticed that he'd changed into a pair of orange track pants and a Natty Boh t-shirt. The slippers had stayed, and clashed horribly with his pants.

"Okay, dessert," Sanji said, and led him back into the kitchen. He pulled a container out of the fridge and opened it to reveal several perfect rounds of daifuku.

"Can you get plates from that cabinet?" he asked, pointing.

Zoro did so, and placed them down for Sanji, who was cutting each one in half. First was strawberry daifuku, then plain daifuku, and lastly, daifuku rolled in sesame seeds. He neatly arranged a half of each on the plates before handing one to Zoro.

"Thanks," Zoro said, and Sanji nodded, smiling at him.

They wandered back into the living room and plopped onto the sofa next to each other. "Your turn to pick," Sanji said, dropping the remote in Zoro's lap.

There wasn't much on, but he eventually found a re-run of Metalocalypse and settled on it.

"What does it say about us that both times I've fed you, we've been watching gory television?" Sanji wondered, biting into his strawberry.

Zoro shrugged. "I'm not really bothered by it. Kind of seen worse at this point." He had a bite of the plain daifuku and winced at the sweetness.

"Oh god, I didn't fuck it up, did I?" Sanji asked quickly, horror overtaking his face. "I taste-tested and they seemed fine but did I screw it up somehow?"

Zoro chuckled at how freaked out Sanji was getting, and shook his head as he swallowed. "No. Just sweet."

"Oh. Do you want to trade?"

"Sure. Give me your sesame seed one."

They exchanged, or at least Sanji did. Zoro held the daifuku between his fingertips but refused to let go no matter how hard Sanji tugged at it.

"Eat it," Zoro said finally.

"Are you even fucking _serious_ right now?" he asked, looking incredibly deadpan.

"Eat it."

Sanji leaned forward and chomped down on Zoro's fingers.

"Not like that," Zoro reprimanded.

Except Sanji kept gnawing, eyes lit up with mischief. Zoro reached over with his other hand and pressed his thumb to Sanji's bottom lip.

"Eat it," he said one more time, and Sanji finally drew back enough to eat it from his fingertips.

"This is very degrading, you know," Sanji muttered, shoving his glasses back up where they'd fallen.

Zoro shrugged. "I'll make it up to you."

Sanji's eyes glinted and his mouth curled into a cruel smirk. "Damn right you will."

They finished eating and tossed the plates on the table, full and starting to be lulled into content. Metalocalypse ended, segued into a couple episodes of Adventure Time, and at some point in time, Sanji had squirmed over, gotten Zoro to rest his arm around his shoulders, and they were now both covered in the fuzzy pink blanket.

None of the relationships Zoro had been in before felt anything close to this. He'd always done the traditional shit: take them out to dinner and a movie, wait to have sex, chaste kisses only, try to form some kind of connection despite lack of shared interests, letting himself drift into a sense of complacency, staying because it was what was _normal_.

He'd never felt his skin hum with the closeness of someone, had never felt comfortable just sitting quietly with someone. He wanted to know everything about Sanji, wanted to know what he'd done while he was in France, wanted to listen to him talk about cooking with that sparkle in his eye like he'd done when he was younger. Honestly, he just wanted to be allowed to be this close to him. He had never wanted that with anyone else. He'd always maintained an emotional barrier, and he'd always been satisfied with that.

"What are you thinking about?" Sanji asked sleepily.

Zoro shrugged his shoulders, helpless. He didn't know how to say what he was thinking, and even if he did, he didn't want to scare Sanji off. He had to keep reminding himself that just because he'd loved Sanji what seemed like forever, it didn't mean that Sanji had ever felt a damn thing for him.

"Just how surreal this all is."

Sanji smiled, burrowing his head further into Zoro's shoulder. "A good surreal though. The best surreal."

"Yeah," he whispered.

At some point, Sanji fell asleep on him. He forced himself to carefully maneuver out from under Sanji after a few minutes of just watching him sleep. He still tried to worm his arms around his own waist in his sleep, Zoro noted fondly.

He shut off the TV, turned out all the lights but the one in the hallway, and knelt down in front of the sofa, grabbing Sanji's hands and looping them over his shoulders. Sanji started to stir and Zoro quickly whispered, "Come on, I'll piggy-back you to bed."

Sanji nodded, pliant with sleep, and gripped tighter around Zoro's neck. As he started to stand, Sanji got his legs around his waist too, and laid his head on Zoro's shoulder.

He'd drowsed himself back nearly to sleep by the time Zoro nudged the bedroom door open and lowered him to the bed. The light filtering in from the balcony beside it was enough to see by and he watched as Sanji pulled himself up into the messy black sheets, arms spread upward as he stretched and yawned.

"Sorry I'm so boring and fall asleep before midnight," he whispered.

Zoro smiled, bending over a little bit to take Sanji's glasses off for him, folding them up and placing them on the nightstand. "That's alright."

"Can you stay tonight?" Sanji asked, rubbing at his eyes.

"Do you want me to?"

"Yeah. I'll make breakfast for you again tomorrow."

"Can't deny how much I love your breakfast."

Sanji smiled, grabbing Zoro's hand and tugging at it gently. "Stay."

"Yeah, okay," he murmured, and stripped down to his boxers before sliding in on the other side of the bed. Sanji curled in around him, and neither of them moved an inch away from the other in the night.

* * *

The sun just barely peeking up was what woke Zoro, and not the fact that Sanji was resting on one elbow above him, smiling a huge, shit-eating grin at him.

"What'd you do, shit cook?" he asked, suddenly wide awake and suspicious, the insult slipping out of his mouth almost as easily as it had when he was fifteen.

"Just doodling!" Sanji said innocently, and that was when Zoro noticed his chest had been covered in feathery strokes of marker, presumably in the past couple minutes.

Sanji flung one long leg over his hips and leaned down, uncapped Sharpie in one hand moving dangerously close to Zoro's face.

"Get off and let me go wash this off and I won't kick your ass," Zoro said, voice rising slightly.

"But you promised to make last night up to me," Sanji said, dragging a line down Zoro's throat with the Sharpie. "And getting to fuck with you would make it up to me."

"Fine, I'm just going to stop reacting," Zoro said.

"No fun," Sanji pouted, but continued to draw shapes over Zoro's chest and stomach, working around the gnarled scar. Finally, he gave up and clambered back off of Zoro into the sheets beside him. "Go wash up then," he sighed. "There's an extra toothbrush in the bathroom closet you can use too."

Zoro took his time taking it off with a washcloth and a little soap, then he brushed his teeth and took a piss. When he wandered back into the bedroom, Sanji was on the dim balcony, stretching his legs out using the railing, cigarette in his mouth as he did so.

He grabbed a blanket off the bed, wrapped it around his shoulders, then slipped out onto the balcony.

"You always flash your panties to the world in the freezing cold, or you just showing off for me?" Zoro asked, as Sanji's head came parallel to his ankle and one hand reached up, tapping ash off his cigarette.

"Why, you getting all hot and bothered by it?"

"A little."

Sanji turned and smiled sharply at him around his cigarette. "Give me a couple minutes to finish this up and I'll start breakfast."

Zoro waited as patiently as he could with ice under his feet and an extremely flexible blond contorting himself in front of him, which was to say not very patiently at all.

Finally, Sanji wound down and nudged Zoro back toward the door. He took the hint and walked inside, but didn't let Sanji get far. As soon as the door was closed, he backed Sanji toward the bed.

Sanji got the hint easily, clambering backwards on it and collapsing against the pillows. Zoro followed, slid between Sanji's thighs, cupped his hands around Sanji's jaw and kissed his mouth.

This was much slower and less coordinated than any of their kisses before; Zoro wasn't very lucid yet despite his rude awakening, and found it hard to keep himself from getting distracted by all the other places he could touch.

Sanji too seemed slightly unfocused. There was no rhythm to the kisses they placed upon each other, just a lazy lick of the tongue here, an uncoordinated tilt of the head there.

They eventually separated and Sanji let out a soft breath. "You gonna fuck me now?" he asked, tugging his fingers through Zoro's hair. "I'd like that."

"I don't know. Do you really deserve it?"

Sanji bit his lip and pulled his boxer briefs down slowly, teasingly. "Don't you think I deserve it?" he asked.

"If you're gonna twist my arm," Zoro said, smirking as he leaned back onto his heels.

"Calm down there, don't strain anything with your enthusiasm."

Zoro laughed as he nipped at Sanji's neck, dragging his fingertips over a nipple. Sanji shuddered and Zoro let his hand come to rest on the curve of his waist as he worked lower. Then he realized he was touching the tail of the fox and stroked over the lines of ink slowly.

Sanji's eyes were sharp, narrow as he looked down at Zoro.

"What the hell's this all about anyway?" Zoro asked, fingers brushing over the bristly white end of the tail.

"Ugh, I'll tell you later. It's way too early to talk about my lame reasons."

Zoro laughed, leaning down to sweep his tongue over the tattoo. Sanji made a pitchy noise of surprise and squeezed his fingers through Zoro's short hair.

"Oh, do you like that?" he asked.

Sanji didn't answer, just exerted a little force against the back of Zoro's head to hold him there. Zoro licked again, and though the taste and texture of this skin wasn't any different from the unmarked, there was something he liked about it. He nibbled at it gently, and Sanji gasped, pushing up against Zoro.

"You do like it," Zoro whispered against his skin, gripping hard at the other side of Sanji's waist.

"I just like it when you pay attention to the things that are important to me," Sanji said, incrementally releasing his grip on Zoro's hair.

He made a mental note to himself about that, then took Sanji's half-hard cock in hand, licking wetly at it a couple times before something smacked into his head.

Upon pulling back and glancing around, he found that it was a bottle of lube and a condom packet now lying innocently on the bed, but he paused a moment longer to give Sanji his best unimpressed face.

"I'm not sure it's in your best interests to give me a concussion right now," he muttered, flicking the cap on the bottle.

"Quit your bitching and get to it," Sanji said, sounding entirely too cheery.

As much as he wanted to be a contrary bastard, he got to it. He didn't finger Sanji nearly as thoroughly as he had the other night - he didn't want him to _come_ from it this time after all - but it wasn't exactly the cursory preparation either. Just enough that Sanji was panting and telling him to hurry it up.

Finally he went to his knees, wiggled a pillow under Sanji's back, tore the packet open and rolled the condom on, slicking it quickly.

"Ready?" he asked.

"Ready as I'll ever be," Sanji replied, grinning up at him.

Zoro took a deep breath and positioned himself, pressing forward slowly. It was tight and stilted goings, and when he could tear his eyes off the sight of his cock sinking into Sanji's body, Sanji's eyebrows were drawn together, slightly pained.

"Need me to stop?" he asked, voice a little breathless.

"No, keep going," Sanji said, face determined.

Zoro did as he was told, seating himself fully as Sanji's body opened up to him, and paused there.

"God, would you just move already? The sooner you do, the sooner it'll be good, bastard," Sanji said, working his hips down as much as he could.

Zoro grinned, planted his hands next to Sanji's head, and shoved up into him. Sanji's head fell back into the pillows as Zoro set up a rhythm, and eventually they managed to find each other's pace, Sanji pushing up to meet Zoro as he thrust.

It was almost overwhelming in its goodness, not so much because the sex was exceptional (though it was), but because of who it was with. The lingering avatar of sixteen year old Zoro was having a fucking field day inside of him. And the Zoro of right now was almost stunned by disbelief, blindsided as he suddenly wondered just how the fuck he'd gotten here, doing this with Sanji of all people, getting to see him like this, looking this strung-out with pleasure because of _Zoro_.

Sanji had locked his ankles together behind Zoro's back, pulling him deep and hard. With not a whole lot of leverage to fuck him now, he was basically just shoving repeatedly into Sanji rather than pulling out.

But Sanji was panting, fingers digging hard into Zoro's shoulders. "Like that," he breathed, hips tilted up, hand working on his cock.

So Zoro kept on, just like that, even as he felt the tightening sensation in the pit of his belly and tried to force it down. Sanji grabbed his face abruptly, pulled him down for a kiss full of tongue, and then Zoro felt the slickness of Sanji coming, groaning against Zoro's lips. His legs loosened and dropped back to the bed, and Zoro finally pulled back just enough, fucking him with hard, long strokes a couple more times before he came too, head bowed and arms shuddering as they threatened to give. Quickly, he rolled the condom down and tied it off, handing it to Sanji who tossed it into the trash can on his side of the bed.

Then he came down on Sanji slowly, as if in a dream, and just laid there for several minutes. At one point Sanji twisted to the side, and a few seconds later, Zoro heard the flick of a lighter and smelled smoke.

He laughed into Sanji's chest and glanced up at him with one eye. "Well if this isn't a cliche, I don't know what is."

Sanji smiled at him, lazy and heavy-lidded as he tapped a bit of ash into the ashtray now sitting beside them on the bed. "Maybe I just needed a smoke break."

"Or maybe I just fucked you really good," Zoro quipped.

"It was _passable_."

"It was pretty fucking amazing."

"There's room for improvement," he replied, blowing smoke out the side of his mouth.

"I'll have to practice a lot then."

"Oh? I'll help you out."

They went silent, both of them with small smiles on their face. Sanji eventually put the cigarette out in the ashtray and placed it back on the nightstand, then kneed Zoro in the stomach. "Shower."

"Just a few more minutes."

"No. Now. Then breakfast."

Zoro groaned and rolled off of Sanji. "Your bed is so comfortable though."

"You'd rather sleep than eat?"

"Yes."

"I'm never feeding you again."

Zoro hopped up as if he'd been poked with a cattle prod and headed for the bathroom.

"Good doggy!" Sanji called out. "Also, you didn't close the blinds so all my neighbors just got an eyeful of your ass."

"Good for them."

Sanji's shower was larger than Zoro's, and nicer too. He probably should have expected it since Sanji was always kind of particular about his comforts (if he were younger and stupider, he might have used the word 'prissy'), but he couldn't imagine being that serious about the fifteen minutes he spent in the shower every day that he'd spend $300 on a rainfall shower head. Sanji obviously had no qualms.

The only distraction from getting clean was how many times Sanji lobbed soap at his head, but they eventually made it out and got themselves dried off. He had to borrow a pair of boxer briefs from Sanji, and he found himself scowling the entire time Sanji smirked, digging through his drawers for a pair. The ones he finally presented were thankfully just plain black, but slightly tighter than was particularly comfortable.

"If my balls die, I'm blaming you," Zoro muttered once he'd pulled them up.

"Your balls aren't gonna die, stop being overdramatic."

Zoro finished dressing in his clothes from yesterday, then stood in the doorway of Sanji's closet as he flicked through hangers.

"Is picking out something to wear always such a chore for you?" he asked after Sanji had pulled out several different shirts, only to replace them again.

Sanji shrugged. "It's kind of relaxing for me." He finally settled on a red and white striped v-neck and extremely form-fitting black trousers with suspenders. Zoro had to resist tugging him around by them.

"Breakfast now?"

"Well, I guess I did promise," Sanji teased.

Sanji was obviously much more at home in his kitchen than he was in Zoro's; he could do nothing but watch as Sanji balanced each task effortlessly. One second he was mixing waffle batter, the next he was supervising the mixer as it whipped cream, then he was flipping bacon, or chopping fruit, and then he'd cycle it all around again. And he did it all with a cup of coffee constantly in one hand.

Once he'd stuck the whipped cream and berries in the fridge, he lit a cigarette and began ladling batter into the waffle iron.

Tentatively, Zoro asked, "Can I help with anything?"

"You can squeeze some juice, if you like. I have a juice maker but I'd like to see those muscles at work," Sanji said, turning his head to wink at Zoro.

Zoro laughed. "Sure. You'll have to show me how, though."

"It's not hard. Hold on a second," Sanji said, quickly unloading and reloading the waffle iron.

Then he sidled up beside Zoro, put down a chopping board, and plucked a basket of oranges from the island. "Okay. You roll it around a little to get the juices flowing," he said, demonstrating. "Then you cut it in half and... hold this." He handed Zoro a handheld juicer, put the orange half in pulp-side down, and rested the dome on the skin. "Now squeeze it over the measuring cup."

Zoro did as he was told, and looked somewhat proud when a stream of juice came out.

"Good!" Sanji said, leaning across to place a kiss on Zoro's cheek. "Then keep doing that until you have two cups and I'll come help you again."

Zoro set to work, diligently going through five oranges. At some point, Sanji finished all the waffles and had now taken over the chopping board, neatly peeling and slicing up ginger. He dropped the slivers on top of some ice, sugar, and a chopped up banana, and then once Zoro had finished squeezing all the juice, he grabbed the measuring cup and dumped it in with a healthy amount of vodka, and blended it.

"Go ahead and get you some waffles, I'll pour this."

"How many waffles do you want?" Zoro asked, deciding to serve Sanji up at the same time.

"Just one. And three pieces of bacon."

Zoro nodded, dished it up though it looked nowhere near as pretty as Sanji could have done it, then took the plates into the dining room.

It looked a lot different in the morning sunlight, small and homey and warm rather than large and empty. He could see people out walking their dogs far below, and signs of awakening in other tall apartment buildings.

Sanji came in, depositing the glasses on the table before turning into the kitchen again. He was back a moment later with the bowl of cream and berries, which he placed in the center before sitting down in front of Zoro.

They both topped their waffles accordingly and dug in. It was delicious, of course, and he paused when he took a sip of the juice.

"That's weird... but good," he said. Sanji nodded, too busy eating to reply.

When they'd finished, Zoro offered to help clean up again, and he was relegated to putting the leftovers away while Sanji rinsed the dishes.

"So why do you live in an apartment like this?" Zoro asked, dumping the fruit into a tupperware bowl. "No offense but it doesn't really seem to gel with your hipster aesthetic."

Sanji shrugged, clanking around in the sink. "It had the best kitchen of all the places I looked at... the view's not bad either."

"You're fucking kidding me."

"Nope."

"Why didn't you just do your own kitchen?"

"I dunno. I don't plan to live in an apartment my whole life. Seems kind of pointless to spend money on something that isn't the final goal."

"I guess that makes sense," Zoro said, still reeling at the idea of settling for somewhere just because of the kitchen.

They finished cleaning up, and then, as much as he didn't want to leave, Zoro wrapped Sanji up in his arms and pressed a couple kisses on him.

"I gotta go. Work today."

"Damn. Don't feel like you have to get out of my hair," Sanji said, kissing Zoro back just as much.

"Sorry. I'd stay longer if I could."

Sanji sighed. "I understand. Text me later."

"Yeah, definitely."

"Thanks for staying over," Sanji said, still clinging. Zoro sort of got the feeling that Sanji wasn't overly fond of saying goodbye.

"My pleasure."

"Thanks for fucking me."

" _Anytime_ ," Zoro said with feeling.

"Okay. I'm letting go, but I don't want to. See you later."

"Bye." They shared one more long, lingering kiss, and then Zoro turned away.

His heart felt light as a feather from the moment he left Sanji at his apartment door to the time he got to his own.


	3. Impossible

Halfway through Zoro's shift on Tuesday night, Sanji called rather than texting for a change. With barely a pause to glance at the screen, Zoro answered, focused more on reading the reports that were sitting in front of him than on who was at the other end.

"Kinda short notice but I forgot to ask the other day before you left," Sanji said almost immediately. Zoro heard the distinct sound of him lighting a cigarette close to the speaker. "Everybody's going to be over at my place for Thanksgiving this year. It'd feel weird if we left you out, so I was wondering if you wanted to come."

"Yeah, definitely." _Witness asserted the attacker was wearing an animal mask of some type, but could not be clear on what the animal was._

"Okay, well, I didn't want to assume or anything!"

"Assume away. I like bothering you." _He further stated that on attempting to comfort the victim, she repeatedly said that the attacker had seemed to come from out of nowhere_.

"I like being bothered by you," Sanji said, breathing out a stream of smoke that could be heard through the phone. In the background, someone was shouting, and metal was being banged around. He must have been, if not actually _in_ the kitchen, then somewhere very close to it.

"Do I need to bring anything?" _On my arrival at the scene, the victim's shirt had been torn and a strip of it was determined to be missing. It has not been recovered from the scene_.

"Eh, you can bring some wine."

"What kind?" _Victim's shirt has since been taken into evidence for analysis of any unique fibers_.

"Just good wine. White, if you can manage it."

"Fine. When do you need me there?" The report ended, and he clicked his pen a couple times. Finally, he wrote down a note: _Tashigi - modus operandi is a dead ringer. Keep an eye out._

"Uh, maybe two o'clock would be good. Do you mind helping me out some?" The shouting in the background had stopped, though the banging around was going stronger than ever.

Zoro rubbed his temples, wondering how the hell Sanji managed to listen to that for a whole twelve hours everyday. "No, but I don't know why the hell you'd need my help." He finally pushed the files away and kicked his feet up on the desk.

"It's not rocket science, it's just cooking. You'll be helpful, don't worry."

"Hm, whatever you say."

Both of them reluctant to hang up, their conversation trailed off into pointless flirting territory - at least on Sanji's end. Zoro mostly just grunted at him and tried not to give away the fact that it was both flattering and embarrassing. About fifteen minutes later, Sanji blew out a final breath. "Okay, I gotta get back to work now."

"Alright," said Zoro. He let his legs fall off the desk. "Text me when you leave, if you want. Give me something good to do while I wait for my shift to end."

"Okay. I'll talk to you in a little while then."

"Yeah, bye."

"Bye."

Zoro tapped the end call button and set his phone on the desk beside the stack of files he had yet to get to. They had been silently taunting him all afternoon, and he was convinced there was no way he'd manage to read them all tonight.

"Who was that?" asked a deep voice from the doorway.

"Uh," said Zoro intelligently, glancing up from where he'd been staring at the dark screen of his phone, the remainder of a smile on his face fading quickly.

"Slackin' on the job to have phone sex?" Smoker asked, though it was clearly rhetorical.

Zoro frowned. He might have told Ace that he'd never seen Smoker crack a smile, but the man had the driest damn sense of humor on the face of the planet. Talking to him, one kind of got the feeling that Smoker was constantly laughing at everyone in his own head.

"Nah. Guy I'm seeing invited me to Thanksgiving," he said. He straightened up in his chair out of habit, though he was far past the point of being formal with Smoker after all these years.

"Hmm... Finally datin' again?" Smoker asked. The smouldering ash on the end of his cigar looked in danger of falling off any second now.

"I wasn't _avoiding_ it, I just wasn't interested in anyone."

"Must be pretty special then."

Zoro didn't want to go into it, so he refrained from providing many details and sealed it off with a topic change. "Yeah. He's pretty special. By the way, I heard Portgas is trying to get into your pants."

Smoker looked almost taken aback for a moment, but it was quickly replaced with an expression of ill temper. "That damn brat ain't doin' shit but fuckin' around."

"Really? He said he was interested in you. Might do you good to have a nice southern boy around," Zoro said, trying to hide his taunting smile against his hand.

"His interest wouldn't stay on somethin' longer than a month if his life depended on it," Smoker said dismissively. He strode into the room and kicked the door mostly shut behind him, glass window rattling in its frame. It was obviously a conversation he didn't want to have with the rest of the station listening in - and they would, if he gave them even half a chance.

Zoro leaned forward in interest, propping his chin in the palm of his hand. "You rag on me all the time about not giving people chances," he said, thinking specifically of some of Chief Garp's underlings, who, last he had seen them, were glorified errand boys. One in particular had a very specific kind of hero worship, which Smoker liked to bring up at the strangest moments. Smoker, after all, had a very skewed understanding of what counted as a crush. "But you haven't been in a relationship as long as I've been here. What's _your_ deal?"

"My _deal_ is that I don't have time for a relationship on top of tellin' all you morons what to do." He finally tapped his cigar out on the rim of Zoro's trash can, and Zoro was about to grab the extinguisher beside his desk before he realized there was nothing in there that could catch fire.

"Bull _shit_. You wouldn't let me get away with an excuse like that."

Smoker grinned, shark-like. "I'm your boss, though. I can use my authority to shut you up, which I'm gonna do now."

Zoro closed his mouth, glowering worse than a teenager.

"Tashigi asked me to bring you these while she's out gettin' lunch for us," he continued, dropping a manilla folder on top of the already-towering pile of reports with a soft _thwap_. "Incident report. Apparently the security tapes we collected from last week's arson are gone, and now somebody's ass is on the line."

Zoro took a deep breath in, then let it out with a woosh. "Our security tapes didn't show anything?"

Smoker let out a booming laugh. "You actually think it'd be that easy? Nope. The night watch guys are in a fuckin' tizzy; they didn't see or hear nothin' either. No fingerprints. Not a goddamn thing."

Honestly, Zoro couldn't find it in himself to be that shocked. These kinds of things very rarelyhappened, but never say never. He could recall maybe one evidence-related incident total since he'd been here - some politician's delinquent kid went off and got himself tangled up in something, only to wind up dead a few weeks later, and all of the evidence related to it had been destroyed in an explosion a couple days after that. There'd been a whole internal investigation and everything. Zoro hadn't been on that case, but it had been an incident so chaotic that nobody, not even those who weren't involved, wanted to think about it for fear of getting a migraine two years after the fact.

It was kind of like he'd been waiting for something else to happen in this vein, and now that it had, there was nothing left to do but deal with it. "Yeah, alright, I'll start looking into it," he sighed, already feeling exhausted at the prospect of it.

* * *

It wasn't until Zoro got home that he realized Sanji had probably texted him. He'd practically gone into a trance, hard at work, and didn't come up for air until well after his shift had ended.

Sure enough, when he plugged his phone in to charge and it came to life, there were a couple messages from Sanji.

' _fucking exhausted. what i wouldn't give for a massage right now._ '  
Received at 10:13 PM.

' _currently i am witnessing two thirteen year olds necking on the subway. we weren't like this when we were that age, were we?_ '  
Received at 10:49 PM.

' _wait, i mean as individuals. obviously_ we _weren't doing anything like that with each other at thirteen_.'  
Received at 10:49 PM.

' _i thought you were supposed to be out of work by now? :\_ '  
Received at 11:20 PM.

' _anyway, i'm home safe. let me know what's up when you get the chance_.'  
Received at 11:42 PM.

Zoro glanced at the clock at the top of the screen and sighed. It was 2:20 now, too late to call or text Sanji, so he skipped straight to his voicemail and left a hurried message.

"Hey. Something came up at work and I got really deep into it. Anyway... nothing too big. I'll talk to you tomorrow. Sleep well."

He hung up, then went to the practice room, focusing on going smoothly and accurately through each kata. When his body felt like it could barely move anymore, he finally went to bed, though he laid there in thought for half an hour before he actually dropped to sleep.

* * *

On the way to work on Wednesday, Zoro stopped by one of those fancy-pants wine shops in Brooklyn Heights and got a couple bottles of white that the fancily-dressed wine lady suggested. Or at least he figured she did - she'd used a lot of flowery terms that he didn't fucking understand, so he took it to mean 'yes, this wine sounds like it would be perfect for a traditional made-up American holiday meal.'

He and Tashigi got down to business as soon as he got in, and he took only a single break around mid-afternoon to text with Sanji, who had let him know that he wasn't upset last night, just worried. They had a working dinner of curry goat and rice and peas from one of the Jamaican places down the block, and Zoro got to go home on time.

Thursday dawned bright and early for him, thanks to the kids shouting on the goddamn sidewalk down below. He sighed and resigned himself to not being able to fall back asleep. Instead, he laid in bed and finished reading the book he'd started earlier in the week.

By the time he dragged himself out from under his warm sheets, it was 11, so he hopped in the shower and went through his 'I'm Seeing Sanji' routine, as he'd now dubbed it - shaving extra-carefully, putting on cologne, giving more than the usual effort over what to wear. Frankly, it was pitiful, and he knew it too.

It felt weird, but he put on the only nice pair of pants he owned that weren't for work - perfectly-cut slim charcoal trousers that he'd worn to Kuina's wedding. She'd taken him to some high-class tailor's and made him get fitted for a bespoke suit, but apparently the end result hadn't been too shabby.

Then, because there was no way he was going to look all formal and stuffy, he topped it off with a red plaid shirt and the same diagonally-zipped leather jacket he'd had since he was 21. He stuffed his feet into a pair of worn-out black low-top Chucks and drifted awkwardly around the house, feeling strange to be fully dressed.

In front of the TV, he ate some leftover cold pizza, and at half to two, he locked up and headed for Sanji's, managing to get turned around only twice this time.

"It's open!" Sanji shouted when he knocked at the door half an hour later. Zoro let himself in and followed the amazing scent into the kitchen, where Sanji was looking incredibly harried as he mixed together something orange and spicy-smelling.

"Hey," he said, breathless as he dumped the mixture into a pie shell.

"Hey," Zoro replied. "Looks like a tornado hit in here."

"God, I am never doing Thanksgiving dinner for more than ten again, I'm too out of practice. This is the fucking worst."

"Smells amazing, though. Do you want the wine in the fridge or what?"

"No, don't put it in. Can you do me a favor and stir the creamed corn?"

Zoro nodded and lifted the lid off of the crockpot sitting beside the stove, giving it a good stir with a nearby wooden spoon. Then he put the bottle of wine down on the counter and opened up the fridge, wanting to peruse the menu for tonight before anyone else. It was a good thing Sanji didn't want the bottle in there, because he'd have been hard-pressed to find somewhere for it to actually _fit_. The thing was full of food, and that wasn't even the total of it - just things that needed to be refrigerated or that wouldn't go in the oven just yet. He felt his mouth start to water a little.

"Did you have lunch before you came over?" Sanji asked.

"Nope," Zoro lied quickly.

"There's some leftover spicy peanut stir fry with chicken and rice in the fridge somewhere if you want it. You can make me some space by getting rid of it."

"You're the best," Zoro announced, digging around in the depths.

Sanji laughed, slightly hysterical. "Definitely feeling it right now."

Triumphantly, Zoro came up with a tupperware container that had been stuffed in the very back and popped it into the microwave, setting it going before he leaned on the counter.

"It'll be fine. It'll taste good, and everyone will love it and want to kiss the ground you walk on for feeding them such amazing food, you shitty cook."

"That was a contradiction, moss-for-brains." He'd moved on to checking the rolls, which were rising in the sunlight of the dining room. "I haven't had a cigarette since I woke up. And I woke up at 5 to get all this going."

"You've had coffee though."

"Yeah. I feel like I'm about to snap out of my skin at any point."

"Don't worry. You'll get through this. I said I'd help you."

Three hours later, they'd made it through, just barely. Zoro doubted he'd been all that great of a help, but Sanji had thanked him and said he was grateful anyway. Now all that was left was the rolls in the oven.

"I never got my hello kiss," Sanji said after he'd wiped his hands off, leaning in for a long, slow one. Zoro happily gave it to him, and when Sanji pulled back, he smiled at him. "Thank you again. Seriously. I'd have probably had a breakdown without you."

"Stop trying to make me feel needed."

Sanji laughed and dragged a hand over Zoro's hair, making his earrings jingle together. "... You look really good."

"Thanks."

"Thank _you_. Alright, I'm gonna take a super fast shower, I'll be out in ten minutes. Everybody's supposed to start showing up in about half an hour, but Ace and Luffy might get here early thinking they can make off with everything before it's time. Nami'll probably be coming with Luffy, so just please let them in if they get here before I come out."

"Yeah."

"And don't think _you_ can sneak any food off either," said Sanji sternly.

Zoro paused, feeling caught out.

"Just sit down and watch TV or something," Sanji said, exasperation evident in his tone. He retreated to his bedroom, and after searching for anything else to eat (a piece of ham wrapped around a piece of pepperjack cheese and a handful of cherry tomatoes) Zoro followed him in. He laid down at the bottom of the bed and let his feet hang off. Then, bored, he switched the TV on and half paid attention to some trashy daytime talk show as he listened to the shower running.

Sanji came out several minutes later with a towel around his waist, hair half-dried and forming soft waves across his face. "Whatcha doing?" he asked upon noticing Zoro.

Zoro shrugged. It was as simple as just wanting to be _here_ , not in the spotless, Sanji-less living room.

Sanji smiled at him fondly, and shook his head. "Well, that's fine." He backtracked into the closet, reappearing a moment later with an armful of clothes. The towel dropped and Zoro turned on his side, watching intently as Sanji pulled on underwear, then a pair of black trousers, a white button-up, and a V-cut waistcoat.

Zoro gaped, then laughed a little. "You look like one of your wait staff."

"So mature," Sanji sighed and sat down on the bed beside Zoro to put his contacts in.

"I'd almost gotten used to seeing you in your glasses."

"I've just been lazy lately."

"I like them though."

"Do you? Even though you have to position your head perfectly at 130 degrees to kiss me?"

"Someday I'm going to come on your face while you're wearing them," Zoro said, grinning wickedly.

"Why the fuck are you so _weird_?" Sanji asked, as if he were actually _shocked_ by the fact, and Zoro was cut off from answering by the doorbell ringing.

They trailed down the hallway, Zoro standing back as Sanji opened the door with a smile at the ready, which quickly turned into a frown when he saw that it was only Ace and Luffy. Nami came up a minute or two after them, looking thoroughly exasperated, but Sanji was quick to give her that smile and a hug, both of which she returned with some reluctance.

Luffy flung himself into Sanji's back, wrapping him up in a full-bodied hug with both his arms and legs. "Saaanji! When's dinner?" he practically shouted.

"Once everybody's here, then we'll eat, and not a second before! What was I thinking, inviting the biggest-eating brothers in the whole state _and_ Zoro?"

Nami shrugged, looking about as pleased as Sanji was. They had almost identical scowls on their face, and Zoro had to laugh.

"Oh, Zoro's here?" Luffy asked, already on to the next topic.

"Hey Luffy," Zoro said, holding his arms out for Luffy to leap into next.

"Zoro! Why are you here?"

Zoro paused for a moment, wondering if Sanji wanted it known or not.

"Zoro's my boyfriend," Sanji said nonchalantly. He'd given a glass of wine to Nami in the meantime, and she was looking very thankful for it.

"Heh? Ah, well, I guess that you two would be good for each other!" Luffy said.

Zoro wanted to ask what that meant, but Luffy had already darted off after Ace, who'd managed to sneak away undetected toward the kitchen.

Sanji was off after them almost immediately, leaving Nami and Zoro in a vaguely uncomfortable silence. Nami was often sharp-tongued and vocal and he was used to that, but they weren't particularly close, though they generally tended to get along. She led the way into the living room and Zoro followed after, not knowing what else to do. They were quickly joined by an angry Sanji who was dragging Luffy and Ace, both of them looking put-out and miserable, away from the kitchen by the backs of their shirts.

They picked up a conversation that consisted mostly of Sanji whining about how tired he was, Luffy whining about how hungry he was, Ace being too asleep to whine about anything, and Nami being just tipsy enough that nothing bothered her. Zoro was silent, only pitching in quips when they burned too hot to not be set free. The doorbell rang after about fifteen minutes, and no one stood, so Zoro waited a couple seconds before he gave in and got it himself.

It was Franky and Robin, both wrapped tight in matching scarves, then it was Usopp and Kaya, who were entirely immersed in each other, but drifted apart as Usopp caught sight of Franky and Kaya gravitated toward Robin. After that came Chopper, looking very rosy-cheeked, and lastly Brook, who surprisingly wasn't dead of the cold considering how skinny he was.

Once everyone was in, they gravitated from the living room to the dining room, fanning out around the table, some of them filling glasses with wine, some of them (more specifically, Luffy and Ace) fighting over which pieces of meat were going to be theirs, most of them seating themselves and passing around serving dishes.

"It looks super," Franky announced, heaping Robin's plate with mashed potatoes before passing the bowl on to Chopper.

"Yes, I can't wait to try it," Robin said, shouts of agreement filling the room.

Zoro glanced around himself. Nami was barely holding Luffy and Ace back from eating everything out of the serving dishes. Chopper looked mournful as he was passed the empty roll basket, but brightened when Sanji returned from the kitchen with another pan full of them. Kaya was smiling gently upon Brook and Usopp's impromptu fork fight and the resulting sound effects. Franky and Robin's heads were bent together as they whispered to each other, both of them smiling.

Zoro felt so warm and happy to be here with the friends he loved. It felt exactly the same as Thanksgiving when he was a kid, chaotic but close, comfortable, nostalgic. A room full of people that he genuinely enjoyed spending time with. It was something he hadn't gotten to experience in the past couple years. And though Kuina had been disappointed when he'd called her and said that he wouldn't be able to make it to their tiny, three person meal this year, she'd relented when he promised that it wasn't because of work.

Then he frowned as he thought of something. He yanked Sanji back by the belt loop as he passed, and Sanji turned to glare at him.

"Where's Zeff spending Thanksgiving?" he asked.

Sanji's look softened. "He's spending it with Chopper's grandma."

Zoro's eyebrows tilted up. "Is that a joke?"

"Nope. They're horrible together, I don't want them here. Give either of them a drink and suddenly she's pinching everybody's butt and he's trying to make out with her." Sanji shuddered, obviously picturing it in his mind. "It's okay though. He wanted to cook for her, so don't worry about them."

"Alright," Zoro replied dubiously. "Hurry up and come sit down."

"In a second, I have to make sure everyone's got what they need first."

"They can take care of themselves," Zoro said, gruff, but Sanji had already worked his way around to the other side of the table.

He finally came back a couple minutes later and glanced down at his plate, which Zoro had filled up while he was off hosting. "Thanks," he said, looking pleased.

"Yeah."

Everybody else had dug in at that point, but Zoro waited for Sanji and only started to eat when he saw Sanji do the same. Zoro's pleased noise at the first mixed-up bite of potatoes, deviled egg, and turkey didn't even get lost under the sounds filling the room.

And there was plenty of happy chattering around the table to be heard. The meal seemed to go on for hours; each time it started to wind down, someone came up with something else to talk about, and naturally the wine flowed and the food followed.

Sanji and Robin had gotten deep into a conversation about a new Thai restaurant opening in Manhattan, Zoro alternately drinking and listening. After hearing Sanji go on and on about how _awesome_ he heard it was, Zoro made plans in his head to take him there some night when neither of them were working.

He turned an ear next to Ace and Luffy, talking excitedly about Luffy's upcoming match against the Silver Fox, who was said to have an aura so intense it seemed to stop his opponents right in their tracks. Luffy was all bravado, entirely sure in his ability to destroy any opponent that came his way, but Ace was warning him not to take it lightly, and Chopper interjected to say that he'd better not get himself as roughed up as he had last time.

Nami and Kaya were discussing Kaya's nurse training quietly, with Chopper occasionally popping in too. It seemed that they were trying to help Kaya through the possibility of the death of her patients, though as far as Zoro knew, Nami had no experience in that area herself. Still, Kaya was nodding and smiling softly, so whatever she was saying, it seemed to help.

By far, the loudest people in the room were Franky and Usopp. Their conversation was full of so much excitability, he couldn't actually determine the subject of it, but he knew them. The things they got excited over were either technology, cars, or sci-fi, so it could have been any of the above.

He had nothing to say, but it felt good just to be surrounded. Sanji's hand was resting on his thigh, thumb occasionally stroking his skin through his pants, a static tease of a touch. Zoro had finished his eighth glass of good wine, and now he felt content and sleepy. His eyes started to blink more and more slowly until they drifted shut and he slipped into a light nap, head resting in his palm, elbow leaned on the table.

When he awoke again, he almost assumed that Sanji had done something to punish him for such awful table manners, but that wasn't it. Everyone was still talking at the same volume, his head hadn't fallen out of his hand or anything... He felt around with each of his senses, straining for any kind of disturbance.

Then he realized that Sanji's hand was no longer on his thigh. He cracked one eye open, glanced to the side, and saw that Sanji wasn't there anymore.

Finally, he opened his other eye, reached his arms up over his head in a stretch, and let out a loud yawn. Typically, it disturbed no one, and they continued with their conversation as he stood up and trailed out into the living room.

No one was in there either, so he tried the hallway. Sanji was standing in it, just tucking his phone back into his pocket, and he glanced up, eyes widening a little when he saw Zoro standing there. The startled expression quickly melted into a smile though, and he stood still as Zoro moved closer to him.

"Sorry. Zeff called," he said, quiet as if the darkness of the hallway necessitated it.

"What'd he want?" Zoro asked, stopping barely an inch from Sanji.

"Just wanted to make sure dinner went okay."

"Mm," Zoro hummed, and leaned down just a hair to capture Sanji's mouth. The kiss was soft, and for all intents and purposes, relatively innocent, but Kaya still put her hand up and blushed when she stumbled upon them.

"Oh, I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to interrupt," she said, taking an uncertain step back.

Zoro felt Sanji's pinky hook around his own and he squeezed gently. Sanji squeezed back.

"No, no problem. Is something the matter?" Sanji asked.

"Ah, no, I just needed to use the restroom."

"Oh, right there." He pointed, and Kaya skirted past them, eyes low and demure.

"Sorry again," she murmured, and then the door shut quietly behind her.

Zoro chuckled. "She's so innocent."

"The only person who _is_ in this city, besides Usopp. It's lucky they found each other."

"I think everyone here has been lucky to find people that complement them," Zoro said. He'd wrapped his arms around Sanji's waist, and they were swaying gently in the darkness now.

"Except Brook and Chopper."

"Brook had his great romance," Zoro murmured against the side of Sanji's hair. "I don't think he's all that worried about finding another. And Chopper... he's still focused on doing _what_ he loves."

Sanji smiled up at him. "You're surprisingly thoughtful, aren't you?"

Zoro shrugged. "My friends are important to me. I like it when they're happy."

Kaya came out of the bathroom, blushing from the time she opened the door to the time she went back through the living room, whispering a pardon on the way.

Zoro let out a bark of laughter and Sanji whacked him on the arm. "It's not funny!"

"It's a little funny."

Sanji conceded, lips twitching a little, and he leaned in for another kiss, this one far less chaste.

"SAAANJIIII! DESSERT!" Luffy shouted from the dining room, easily breaking the moment, and Zoro reluctantly let go of Sanji.

They walked back into the kitchen together, both of them with goofy, happy looks on their faces. Zoro stood by the island as Sanji started to dish up the pies: first pumpkin, then apple, chocolate next, and finally, pecan. Zoro made off with a huge slice of pumpkin, and made sure to get a piece of the chocolate for Sanji before Luffy and Ace got to all of it.

Dessert was just as loud and boisterous as the meal before, and involved a four-way fight between Chopper, Usopp, Luffy, and Ace for the last tub of ice cream. In the end, Sanji smacked each of them on the head with his pie server and told them to divide it between themselves or else they were getting thrown out on their asses.

Zoro had to laugh because of how much Sanji reminded him of Zeff in that moment, but he just shook his head when Sanji looked questioningly at him. He probably wouldn't appreciate hearing it.

Finally the plates were eaten clean, the wine bottles were empty, and every belly was full. The chatter had settled down into contented murmurs, and the mythical turkey drowsiness was approaching quickly.

Sanji, however, was up on his feet, starting to clear the table. That was enough to startle the rest of them into fussing at him to just sit down and relax.

"We'll do the cleaning up," Franky volunteered, and everyone else took up in agreement (though some were reluctant about it).

"I have a disease that causes soap to peel my skin off my bones," said a voice from the back of the room.

"Then you and Brook would be twins!" another voice chimed in.

" _You don't have a disease_ ," a third chided.

"Our esteemed cook deserves a rest," Robin said kindly. She'd stood while the peanut gallery was chipping in their two cents and was now gently pushing Sanji toward the living room, but he was too busy simpering at her and claiming that he didn't mind to notice that fact.

"Why don't you take Zoro with you?" Kaya asked, looking vaguely devilish. Zoro changed his mind. She wasn't innocent _at all_.

Sanji relented, deflating slightly, and grabbed Zoro's hand to drag him along. They wandered toward the sofa and flopped down together, Sanji's head in his lap.

"Do you want to watch the game?" he asked, grabbing for the remote with his socked toes.

Zoro snorted. "I don't know shit about football."

"Neither do I," Sanji admitted as he glanced away to start scrolling through the channels, searching for anything good. Eventually, he stopped on a channel showing some kind of kickboxing competition, which Zoro gathered was about savate even through the unknown, rapid rush of French.

"That looks nothing like what you do," he said after a few moments of watching.

"That's because I don't do that, you just assumed," Sanji said. "I said that the old man was a savateur before he picked up cooking, and I said that he was the one who taught me what I know; I never said that what I learned from him was savate. He wanted to keep up with a regiment after he became a chef, but he couldn't do exactly what he'd done before. Not if he wanted to cook for the rest of his life. So we just mashed up a lot of styles, taking the hands out of the equation. It doesn't really resemble one thing or another, it's not some officially-sanctioned shit you're going to see on TV. It's just what we can do." He shrugged, resuming his channel-flipping.

Zoro conceded that reluctantly, though he was admittedly much more interested now in how exactly they'd managed to form an ever-evolving style over the years with only two people.

"They've probably already started showing Christmas movies," Sanji said, interrupting his thoughts.

"I hate Christmas movies."

Sanji paused, pressed a button, and suddenly the room was filled with lines entirely too familiar from his childhood. They both immediately spoke along in unison.

" _I'm gonna give you to the count of ten to get your ugly, yellow, no-good keister off my property, before I pump your guts full of lead! One. Two. TEN!_ " Gunshots filled the room from the television. They paused, grinning madly at each other, then continued right on cue. " _Keep the change, ya filthy animal._ "

They both burst into hooting laughter, and Luffy's head popped around the kitchen doorway. "I wanna have fun too," he whined, and a neatly-manicured hand fisted in the neck of his shirt, yanking him back into the kitchen.

"Okay," Zoro conceded. " _Home Alone_ is the only Christmas movie I like, though."

"Fun fact," Sanji said, playing with one of Zoro's earrings. "I used to hope we'd all suddenly decide to go somewhere for Christmas, and that I'd accidentally get on a different plane than you guys like in the second movie. Except I wanted to go back to Paris."

"That wouldn't have been good," Zoro said dubiously.

"No," Sanji replied. "It would have been a fucking disaster, but you don't really think those kinds of things through when you're ten years old."

"I guess not." Zoro brushed his fingers through Sanji's hair slowly, petting him like a cat.

The repetitive motions must have lulled him back into sleep, because when he opened his eyes again, Sanji was gone for the second time. In his place was Nami, curled on the other side of the sofa and breathing rhythmically. The apartment was much quieter now. He stood and stretched, scratched his stomach a bit, then went for the kitchen, where the light was still on.

Sanji and Ace were standing around the island, while Luffy sat up on the counter swinging his feet.

"Oh, you're awake," Sanji said, glancing up from where he was putting leftovers in a paper grocery bag.

"How long was I asleep?"

"About an hour. Everyone else had to get home but these two losers and the lovely Nami."

Zoro hummed and leaned on one of the counters next to Luffy, who smiled brightly at him.

"Luffy, go get your coat on and wake Nami up so we can get out of their way," Ace said, obviously wanting a second alone with Sanji. Zoro took the hint and followed Luffy out of the kitchen, intent on his own chance to talk with no one else around.

"Hey," he said, moving closer to where Luffy was attempting to pull on his coat. He kept his voice low, not wanting to be heard by anyone else, despite it not being anything that secretive. "What did you mean that Sanji and I would be good for each other?"

"Mm, well, it's just that he likes to take care of people a lot, and nobody really takes care of you. And you like to protect people, and there are just some people out there that he can't protect himself from."

" _What_?" Zoro asked, abruptly keen and sharp on those words. "What kind of people?"

"Ah, huh? I don't know, it was just a general statement."

Zoro relaxed a little, but it was the kind of thing that he knew in his bones would keep him on edge for the rest of the evening. Something, somehow, was wrong. He hated the feeling.

"Are you going to come see my fight?" Luffy asked once he'd gotten himself all buttoned up in his coat.

"When is it?" Zoro asked distractedly.

"In January! I don't remember the day. Well, maybe I'll see you if there's a New Year's party and I can tell you then."

"Yeah, I'll see if I can as long as you tell me in time."

"You can bring Sanji too! It would be a good date! He's been to lots of my fights before. They get him all pumped up."

Absently, Zoro nodded. Ace had left the kitchen and was now waking Nami up since Luffy hadn't. Sanji stood in the doorway, lit from behind, and Zoro looked harder, noticing something off. Under the cover of darkness, Sanji's mouth was drawn in anger, eyes narrowed practically to slits.

"Okay, we're out," Ace said from the front door. "See ya'll."

"Bye," Zoro said. Sanji was noticeably silent.

The door shut, and the apartment felt like all the air had been sucked out of it. He'd known that Sanji possessed a wicked temper when he was younger, and had been on the receiving end of it too many times to count... But the Sanji he knew now was always relatively cheerful. He had his ups and downs, but Zoro had never seen him like this. He almost wanted to slip out of the door too.

But he didn't. He was going to deal with it, and he was going to calm Sanji down, and they were going to go to bed. They'd had a good night so far, and he wouldn't let a little blip like this fuck it up.

"What's up?" he asked, not bothering to be quiet. He knew from experience that the quieter he was, the more vindictive Sanji would become.

"Ace doesn't know when to keep his damn mouth shut," Sanji snapped, tucking a cigarette into the corner of his mouth. He strode toward the balcony, not glancing at Zoro once.

He knew Sanji wasn't mad at him, but it tore at his heart a little to be so disregarded. This wasn't about him, he reminded himself. It was about Sanji. Sanji was the one who needed to be coaxed down from his upset, not Zoro.

He followed Sanji out onto the cold, windy balcony and leaned against the door after he'd shut it. For several minutes, he stayed silent, letting Sanji smoke through a couple cigarettes first.

Then he approached, placing his hand on Sanji's shoulder. "Hey. I'm not saying you don't have the right to be angry, or that you should feel like I don't want to deal with it, but... is it worth it? Is whatever he said so bad that you want to center your whole night around it?"

Sanji deflated a little, puffing quietly on his cigarette.

"I know pretty well how useless it is to tell somebody to stop feeling things. Obviously you can't just think _it's pointless to be angry_ and magically stop _being_ angry, but if I can do something to help take your mind of it, if you don't want to be thinking about it tonight, then I'll help," Zoro continued.

Finally, Sanji's shoulders sagged completely, and he pulled his cigarette out of his mouth, resting it in the ashtray.

"Sorry. Obviously you shouldn't have to deal with this-"

"I don't mind," Zoro interjected.

"I really don't want to be thinking about what he said tonight. I will eventually, but I just want to concentrate on spending time with you," he finished.

Zoro nodded, and let his hand slide down until it rested like a cage over Sanji's. Sanji pressed his own upward, and locked their fingers together. "Thanks," he sighed. "Sorry I'm acting like an idiot."

"You're not. You shouldn't have to feel like you have to be emotionless in front of me, or that I'll be upset if you only ever show me the happy side of yourself. I want to know all of you."

Sanji turned his head down, but Zoro could see the small upward turn of his lips.

They went inside after a few more minutes of Sanji smoking on the balcony. The journey through the dim apartment was hard goings for Zoro, who tripped over the couch first, then walked into the archway in the hall.

Sanji laughed at him loudly both times, so Zoro felt somewhat justified in grabbing him up and tossing him on the bed.

"Neanderthal," Sanji said, voice forced out of him from being bounced on the mattress.

"Asshole," Zoro countered lamely. He made sure to close the blinds before dropping on top of Sanji this time.

"You're crushing me," Sanji wheezed.

"Should have thought about that before you called me a neanderthal."

"I NEVER ASKED FOR THIS," he cried out, beating Zoro in the small of his back with his foot.

Zoro dragged his fingertips down Sanji's side, then pushed them back up underneath his shirt. The mood shifted easily from joking to intimate, and soon they were kissing, open-mouthed and hinging on desperate. Sanji unbuttoned Zoro's shirt and fought to get it off. He was pretty sure he'd heard string snap in the process.

Sanji tipped him onto the bed, and Zoro let himself roll to the side as Sanji clambered up, hurriedly stripping out of his vest and shirt and following it up with some kind of awkward shuffle on his knees to get out of his pants and underwear.

Then he was on Zoro. He fit his thighs around Zoro's hips and leaned his palms on his chest, effectively holding him down. "It's time for me to pay you back." His cock was half hard between his spread thighs, and from this sight alone, Zoro was definitely getting there too. Sanji kept one palm on Zoro's chest as he leaned over to the nightstand and pulled out lube and a condom.

It took him only a moment to cover one hand in too much lube, then he went up on his knees and pressed the remaining hand to Zoro's chest for balance.

 _Fucking hell_. Now he was watching Sanji finger himself right in front of him. He figured it'd be too smug to tuck his arms under his head and just watch the show, but he was definitely feeling it.

Facially, Sanji wasn't showing much reaction, but it seemed like he wasn't going for stimulation so much as efficiency. After another moment's cursory prep, he scootched back, unbuttoned and unzipped Zoro's pants, then tugged them down along with his underwear, just enough so that he could get at Zoro's cock. He rolled the condom on, slicked him with a palmful of lube.

Then he moved his hands up to Zoro's shoulders and gazed down at him, eyes lidded and teasing. "Ready?" he asked, poised over Zoro.

"Yeah," Zoro replied shakily, as Sanji started to lower himself down. It wasn't slow going - Sanji was a lot less delicate with himself than Zoro was, yet gave no sign of pain anyway.

At last, he settled against Zoro's hips, eyes shut and cheeks flushed, lips wet. Their breathing was perfectly synchronized. The muscles in Sanji's stomach jumped.

He lifted himself back up, ever so slowly. Zoro watched the strain of his thighs as he moved, wishing to take in everything at once.

"Now listen very carefully," Sanji said. "I'm going to fuck you, and at the end you're going to get to come, but from now until then, this is my show. You do what I tell you to do. You stop if I tell you to stop. And I swear to god, if you come before I do, I won't feed you for a week. Now put your hands on my hips."

Zoro swallowed, obeyed, and Sanji finally started to move with intent. Zoro didn't know what to look at first: the way he bit hard on his lip every time he dropped down, or how his thighs didn't tremble a bit, just bunched and released in a steady rhythm, or his cock bouncing against his stomach, or the way every hitching breath in made his abs tighten.

This was definitely the hottest thing he'd ever seen. And he'd once had a girlfriend who reviewed sex toys for a living.

But no matter how hot it _looked_ , it felt even better. Sanji was just open enough that it was practically effortless for him to work himself up and down, but he felt so goddamn tight around Zoro. And the tease of not being allowed to do anything but hold onto Sanji's hips just worked him up even further.

The urge to push him down in the bed and fuck him was strong, but so basic. He trembled from the need to hold himself back, heart pounding in his chest. More than anything, he wanted to force that heat open and stay in it, wanted to get his, but he wasn't going to piss Sanji off.

"I can hear you thinking," Sanji said. He leaned down, still moving his hips, but slowly, and kissed Zoro with a lot more gentleness than his current hardened, demanding behavior seemed to lend itself to. Still, Zoro was grateful, surging up to bite at his lips harshly, mimicking the movement of their bodies by savaging Sanji's mouth with his tongue, taking all that he could get.

In this new position, Sanji couldn't move as deep, but every time he shoved back, he let out a quiet, breathless moan. Zoro squeezed his hands tight around Sanji's hips, fighting the urge to push up into him and make him melt into incoherence.

"Jerk me off," Sanji demanded, pushing himself back up again. Zoro complied, wrapping his fist tight around Sanji's cock, knowing that the sooner he got Sanji off, the quicker he could get himself off too.

It didn't take much, in the end, just a few strokes and Sanji was starting to come. He tilted his hips back, nudging Zoro against that spot inside himself as he spasmed around him, arms shaking and eyes shut, mouth barely open.

Zoro broke. He took that moment, gripping Sanji's waist tight with his free hand and bucking his hips into him as hard as he was able to with his pants around his thighs.

Bliss washed over him as he finally came. His fingers released from their bruising hold on Sanji's waist, dropped to the bed, and he breathed out a heavy sigh, twitching his hips up into Sanji until he was wrung dry.

Sanji lifted up, then rolled off. "That was exhausting."

"That was the best thing I've ever witnessed in my life."

A chuckle right next to his ear, and then Sanji's lips pressed against his cheek. "You sayin' I've got mad sexual prowess?"

"I'm saying you've got moderate sexual prowess, you're decently attractive, and you know, I might like you a little bit." _It's not like I haven't been in love with you for more than half of my life now or anything._

"Hmm," Sanji breathed. "Maybe I like you a little bit too."

Zoro laughed and finally turned his head to look at Sanji. His face was flushed, hair dishevelled, cheek pressed against the pillow. Not for the first or last time, it struck him that he was really _here_. In Sanji's bed. Sanji's boyfriend. He'd just fucked Sanji and now they were going to go to sleep in the same bed, and they were going to wake up together tomorrow, and it would keep going and going until something got in its way.

He kicked out of his pants, feeling sweaty and disgusting as they stuck to him. Then he settled back and cupped his hand over Sanji's tattooed arm, tracing the waves with his fingers.

"Will you tell me what these mean now?" he asked.

Sanji reached toward the nightstand, tapping the dim lamp on, then settled back into the pillows.

"It's the ocean, obviously," he said. "It's caused a lot of separation in my life, but... it brings everything together, too. Do you remember when we went to Ocean City and my stupid boogie board got washed out and I was so upset about it? And then on the last day, we found somebody's message in a bottle?"

Zoro nodded, suddenly remembering that moment though it had never seemed particularly significant to him before. "Yeah. It was in Japanese, so you made me read it to you. Only I couldn't read more than half of it."

"Uh huh. Over the years I just realized, every part of the ocean overlaps. Somewhere in the world, it all comes together and drifts apart again. I found somebody's message, and somebody else found my boogie board. It circulates endlessly. Who knows if the same drop of water has ever touched you more than once?"

That made a kind of sense, Zoro figured, if you subscribed to drunken logic. "So why's that important to you?"

"It's a metaphor, I guess. That you shouldn't ever figure that your actions don't have repercussions. Someone out there that you've never thought about twice has been touched by your actions. And someone who's never thought twice about you has touched your life too. We don't exist in a vacuum. We exist in an ocean." Sanji had an indescribably soft, happy look about his face. It felt like his state of being wasn't even anywhere close to this room anymore, thinking of somewhere far away.

And at the same time, his hand clutched Zoro's tightly, and Zoro couldn't do anything but smile helplessly back at Sanji, the face of a 7 year old boy seeing the ocean this close for the first time suddenly superimposed on him.

"Mm. What about the stuff on your back?"

"Well, foxes and crows are both regarded as incredibly intelligent and formidable despite their size in many cultures. European myth is a lot less lenient on them; it treats crows like harbingers of death and foxes like common tricksters, but Eastern culture tends to depict them as wise, clever creatures. They use their abilities to outsmart rather than relying on size. This reminds me to not just worry about physical strength, but to use my brain too. It's balance. That way I can have the best of both worlds."

"And the flowers?"

"They're delphiniums. Robin said they were my flower. Poisonous in particular quantities, but small amounts will cure a bad appetite," he recited. "She said they represent an air of playfulness and happiness as well, which seems nothing like me... I really just needed something to flesh it all out with."

"It looks good," Zoro said, grazing his knuckles over the fox's tail and a tall flower. "But what's up with the meat cleaver in that crow's mouth?"

Sanji grinned sharply at him. "Well, I'm a professional chef. What do you expect?"

Zoro laughed and poked Sanji in the ribs.

"Your turn," Sanji said after he'd successfully batted Zoro's hands away.

"Hmm?"

"The scar." He pointed at the jagged line up Zoro's abdomen and Zoro pressed his lips together thinly.

"It's going to make me sound like the biggest idiot on the planet when I tell you..."

"Pff, you say that like that's not already what I think of you!"

Zoro smacked him in the stomach and Sanji smirked up at him. "Go on."

"There was a guy..."

"You got shanked?"

"No. He-"

"Mistook you for someone else, someone he had a horrible grudge against?"

"No, stop interrupting me!"

"Buzzkill."

"Anyway, he's an honorable man..."

"Oh god, you're not about to tell me you're married to him, are you?"

"FUCK! No, do you actually want to know or not?"

"Yeah, go on," Sanji said. His face was full of wicked amusement.

"He's a mafia boss. I'd heard about his skills, but I'd never seen him. Before I joined the force, I'd seek these dens out, trying to find him. And when I did, I got cocky. I challenged him, and he completely decimated me."

Sanji was silent. It was obvious he was concerned, despite knowing the outcome.

"Well, he had enough honor to call an ambulance for me. That's kind of when I really decided this is what I wanted to do. Someday I'm going to find him again. I'm going to defeat him."

Sanji blurted out a laugh, and shook his head. "You became a police officer so you can meet some mafia guy again and _beat him in a swordfight_?"

"There's other reasons, too..." Zoro said, feeling himself start to blush. "But... that's a part of it."

"I can't fucking believe you. You're a trip and a goddamn half."

"Says the guy who got high one night, thought about the ocean for a little bit, then decided to get a tattoo of it."

"What the hell did you say, bastard?!" He leapt on Zoro, mock outrage in his voice.

They tussled for several moments, Sanji getting his bony knees and elbows in all of Zoro's delicate places, and Zoro doing a lot of dirty fighting - pulling Sanji's hair, grabbing him by the dick.

Finally they settled, and Zoro let out a laugh. "I just realized I never took the condom off... We just wrestled while I was wearing a condom."

Sanji cackled rather rudely, and it set Zoro off even more. Soon they were in tears, clutching their stomachs and groaning in pain through the laughter.

"What the fuck is even so funny?" Sanji panted.

Zoro's cheeks hurt from smiling so much, but he couldn't make himself stop no matter how hard he tried. "I'll be back in a second."

He went to the bathroom, tossed the condom, then came back with a washcloth after cleaning Sanji's come off his stomach.

It landed with a wet _thwack_ on Sanji's chest, and he startled slightly from where he'd been drifting.

He wiped up the stray jizz on his own stomach, then reached between his legs and said, "Seriously, don't look."

Zoro was starting to laugh again, even harder when Sanji began to blush.

"Seriously! You try dealing with lube leaking out of your ass and come tell me how it feels." He threw the washcloth at Zoro when he was finished, and Zoro tossed it somewhere behind himself, crawling back into the bed.

"Well, if anything, at least you make it look endearing and not gross."

"Aw, that's as good as a confession of love. If I had to watch you wipe up lube from getting fucked, I'd think it was endearing and not gross on you too."

He wasn't going to get all happy over a fucking love/lube metaphor. _He wasn't_. And yet, he felt his heart twinging happily inside of his chest. He forced it down, and settled into the bed as Sanji turned out the lamp.

Sanji's breathing was starting to go deep and heavy before he remembered there was something he wanted to ask. He took Sanji by the shoulder and shook him gently.

"Hmm, what?" he asked sleepily.

"Luffy said that there were some people out there that you couldn't protect yourself from," Zoro said quietly. His hand was brushing repeatedly over Sanji's side, and Sanji kept shivering sensitively. "What the hell did that mean?"

"Huh? It was probably just one of those general Luffy-isms, just him pulling stuff out of his ass."

"You're sure?" Zoro asked.

"Yeah. I've never been in any kind of danger from someone in my life."

"Alright," Zoro said. He finally felt that nauseous, unsettled feeling wash away. "Let's go the fuck to sleep."


	4. Daydreaming

As a kid, Sanji had learned a lot of terrible habits from Kuina that, for some reason, he found to be acceptable despite being neither related to Zoro, nor very much liked by Zoro, thus making him fair game. Among them were the relatively harmless things: bad nicknames that he didn't know the context to, taking things without asking, or invading Zoro's space.

Then there were the things that were really annoying, but didn't quite lead to knock-down drag-out fights: locking Zoro out of the house, spraying him with the garden hose when he was fully-clothed, whapping him in the face with snowballs.

There was two things, and two things only, that put Zoro into a righteous fit of anger: being called stupid, or being awoken by projectiles. A shove, a kick, that was fine, but throwing something at Zoro? That was when you knew you were about to get knocked the fuck out.

Apparently, it was also a habit that Sanji had never broken out of, because Zoro found himself snapping wide awake, temper flaring, when something hard smacked him upside the head.

"Who the fuck is calling you repeatedly at three in the morning?" Sanji asked. Zoro's vision finally adjusted to the darkness in the room only to let him see that Sanji was standing right above him looking very displeased.

Zoro glanced down at the thing that had hit him - his phone - which was now laying on his chest. It had just stopped ringing, but it started again barely two seconds later.

"You've gotta admire Apple. Such great architecture, such wonderful endurance it doesn't even crack on your thick skull. Answer it so I can go back to bed," Sanji said, circling over to the other side of the bed. Even his walk looked grumpy.

Zoro squinted at the brightness of the screen, trying to read the caller ID. "It's my boss. Go back to sleep, I'll take it in the living room," he said, then abruptly fell out of bed thanks to the tangle of sheets around his legs.

There was a huff of laughter beside him but Zoro left the room without defending himself, quickly sliding his thumb over the screen to answer.

"Get over to Tashigi's," said Smoker, before Zoro could even say hello. "Her place was broken into while she was out with some friends earlier. You two need to make sure nothing important is missing."

Zoro took a moment before speaking. "Uh. I've been at Sanji's for the whole night. Has anyone been past my place?"

"No," Smoker said shortly. "Just get over to Tashigi's."

So even though Zoro's house was now the site of Schrodinger's Break-In, he hung up and went back to the bedroom to search around in the dark for his clothes. He dressed quickly then moved over to the bed, where Sanji had already fallen back asleep. Zoro almost felt bad waking him, but he knew he'd feel more guilty if Sanji woke up confused or worried in the morning.

He shook Sanji's shoulder hard until he stirred and swatted at Zoro's hand.

"What?" he asked in annoyance, eyes still closed.

"I gotta go. My partner's apartment was broken into."

"Why do you have to help deal with that?" His tone was tinged with petulance as he rolled onto his stomach, face pressing against the pillow.

"Boss is worried some files might have got stolen."

"Mm. Okay... Will you come back when you're done?"

"If I manage to get out of there anytime soon, yeah."

"Alright," Sanji mumbled, turning his face deeper into the pillow.

Zoro leaned down and pressed a kiss to Sanji's forehead, then got out of there.

An hour later, he pounded up the stairs to Tashigi's apartment. From outside everything looked completely normal, but inside it was utter chaos. Drawers had been pulled out, cabinet doors flung open, pillows tossed off the couches. Feathers fluttered around the room, books were torn apart, and the one, sad plant that Tashigi had ever managed to keep alive was overturned, dirt strewn across the floor. Almost anything that could be put in disarray was.

It was so completely cliche, he had to laugh. Tashigi punched him in the arm and cried out, "Seriously! I already know a couple things are missing! Oh, we're so fucked."

Zoro immediately calmed down, reaching over to rub her back comfortingly. She rarely cursed, and it was a sure sign that she was reaching a breaking point whenever she did. "Hey... whatever it is, we're going to figure it out."

"My laptop is gone," she said, voice wobbling dangerously, and Zoro could tell she was about to work herself into a panic attack. "All my notes are in there, I had the file on that pervert here, I had the stuff on that arms cache!"

Zoro hustled her over to the couch and guided her to put her head between her legs, continuing to rub her back all the while. "Shh, just breathe. Breathe."

They sat like that for ten minutes or so, until her breathing stopped being so shallow and loud. She flopped back into the couch, drained of strength, body still shaky. He cupped his hands around her cheeks and made her look up at him.

"Look, we've got all that stuff in the database. Our only problem is that now someone out there knows what we know."

Her face crumpled again and her eyes started to well up with tears. "I've never been the cause of something like this in my life!" she wailed.

"Listen to me," he said firmly, wiping away the tears that started to fall with his thumbs. "It's _not_ your fault that someone invaded your space. It's not your fault that someone took those files. Nobody blames you for this."

Her back heaved from trying to hold in a sob, and Zoro guided her to stand, walking her through the fallout of the living room toward her bedroom. It was obviously the only place that had received some tidying; the bed was still unmade and the pillows had been shoved onto the floor at the other side, but she'd piled together most of the clothes that had been dumped out of the overturned drawers, and had also stacked together the books that were still in tact. To the side, there was a black garbage bag full of what he assumed was everything that had been unsalvageable.

"Do you have anyone you can call to stay with you?" Zoro asked, helping her to sit on the bed.

Tashigi nodded her head but didn't speak, still trying to hold back any sounds.

"Do you want me to call them for you?"

She nodded again and handed her smartphone to him. It was already dialing, and he put it up to his ear.

The phone rang and rang. He'd started to worry that no one was going to answer when Bellemere finally picked up, immediately asking what was wrong in a sleepy but worried tone.

"Er. Lieutenant, sorry to bother you so late. Tashigi's apartment was broken into and I don't want to leave her here alone. She said you'd be willing to stay with her?"

Bellemere confirmed that she would, and assured him that she'd be over in a few minutes. He very nearly sighed in relief; at least Tashigi had picked someone that was known to be reliable on a consistent basis.

When Bellemere arrived, she looked as if she hadn't wasted any time at all getting out the door. She didn't have a coat and had opted for flip-flops rather than actual shoes, plus her hair was hanging free so that it looked like a razor had only attacked parts of her head in her sleep. There was no hesitation as she climbed into bed next to Tashigi, drawing her in and rubbing her back, whispering firmly and comfortingly to her.

"Uh. I'm gonna straighten up out there some, you two just... Whatever. I'll take over her shift today," Zoro said, backing out of the room.

He went as quickly as possible, really just stuffing whatever was unfixable into a trash bag before righting any furniture and making sure all the doors and windows were locked upon leaving.

At the very least, he knew how they'd gotten in now. The window in the back of the living room had been slid open just a crack, almost as easily if it had never been locked in the first place.

* * *

When Zoro got home a while after six in the evening, the house was warm and smelled of something wonderfully savory. _Broken into by somebody who cooks for their victims_ , Zoro thought with an internal laugh. After he'd hung up his coat and shuffled his shoes off, he moved to look into the kitchen, where Sanji was standing at the stove, humming as he stirred whatever was in the shallow soup pot.

Zoro stepped through the archway and drew to a halt behind Sanji, wrapping both arms around his slender waist and dropping his head onto one fuzzy hoodie-covered shoulder.

"I'm not sure that's appropriate, officer," Sanji said, humor evident in his voice as he took the cigarette out of his mouth. "Also, you're freezing."

To spite him, Zoro pushed his cold hands up under the hoodie. Sanji's belly was warm against his icy fingers, and the muscles in it jumped as Zoro pressed harder.

"FUCK," Sanji yelled, shoving an elbow against Zoro's upper arm. "Get off, asshole!"

"How'd you get in?" he asked. He'd texted Sanji at some point during the day, letting him know what had happened and that he'd just be going straight home when he got off work, but he definitely hadn't expected to see Sanji. It was honestly one of the best kinds of surprises, even if his home had apparently been broken into to make it happen.

"You don't hide your spare key that well. Anyway, you didn't get breakfast this morning before you had to leave, and you probably had fast food for lunch. I figured it'd be nice to come back to something homecooked."

"I guess I appreciate it a little." He peeked around Sanji to try and figure out what was in the pot, and was pleased to see that it was all the fixings for oden. "I'm just surprised you'd want to use my obviously inferior kitchen."

Sanji shrugged, a small smile forming around his cigarette. "Chefs are like... photographers, or writers. You can take an amazing picture even with the most simple camera, but that doesn't stop you from wanting the four thousand dollar one with tons of bells and whistles. And a writer can write a masterpiece with just a pencil and paper, assuming they have a good idea in their head. So long as the ingredients are of a certain quality, I'm fine."

"Hmm... I bet you really want your silicone whisk right now... and your deep fryer..." Zoro said, tilting his head down to nibble on the side of Sanji's neck.

"I always want my silicone whisk and my deep fryer. It's a state of perpetual longing."

"Gonna marry them?"

"I think about them when I'm having sex with you. You're lucky I don't scream 'whisk!' instead of your name," Sanji said, amusement in his tone. He added a couple whole eggs into the pot and turned the heat down, searching around for the lid.

"You've never screamed my name."

"Well you'll have to work on that, won't you. A whisk is one step ahead of you at this point."

Zoro hummed noncommittally, reaching around Sanji to pluck a tube of chikuwa out of the pot and pop it into his mouth. "Hot," he said as he chewed, fanning his mouth.

"That's what you get. Go upstairs and take a shower before dinner, you're disgusting," Sanji said. He'd finally found the lid, and fitted it over the pot.

"Don't talk to me about disgusting. I was the one that had to sit at a desk the entire day smelling like sex," Zoro said as he reluctantly let go of Sanji to turn and head for the stairs.

Sanji snorted and shook his head. "You could have come back and taken a shower."

"Nah, too much-" Zoro stopped abruptly, frozen in place. His heartbeat had sped up significantly when he noticed one of the windows in the dining room was just barely open, and his hands flexed spastically through the air as if to reach for a weapon. Perhaps he'd been too quick in the assumption that his house was fine just because nothing looked out of place. "Sanji... was that window open when you got here?"

"Hmm? Oh, no, I opened it. It was getting hot in the kitchen earlier, I guess I didn't close it all the way."

"Oh," he said, all of the paranoia being pushed out only to be replaced by embarrassment at his overreaction, no matter how internal it was. He moved over and closed the window, then made sure all the others were locked too before heading upstairs.

After a quick, efficient shower, he threw on the last pair of clean sweatpants in his drawers, then hurried back down to the living room. Sanji had laid everything out over potholders on the coffee table, and through the archway, Zoro could see he was staring rather intently into the fridge.

"You seriously own nothing to eat or drink at all," Sanji said when he noticed Zoro's presence.

"You pretty much cleared out the last of it when you made breakfast last week." Zoro wandered into the kitchen, leaning against the counter behind Sanji.

"It's a good thing I went ahead and got groceries after work for this then... All you have to drink is beer."

"You got a problem with beer?"

Sanji turned his head just enough to make a face at Zoro. "It's not really my thing."

"Of course, you want wine with your sandwiches and scotch with your wings, I forgot how fancy you are."

"I'm not _fancy_ , I just have classically-trained tastes!"

"Well I'm drinking beer, if you want something else you're going to have to find it yourself. There's a couple different kinds of tea in that cabinet," he said, pointing. Then he pushed past Sanji to get into the fridge and round up as many cans of beer in his arms as he could.

He moved on to the living room, depositing his spoils on the coffee table before he sat down with a heavy sigh. Despite having basically been sat down all day anyway, it felt good to be _home_ , and the fact that Sanji was here and had fixed dinner made it all the better.

The TV was flipped on, and he busied himself filling a bowl with as much beef as he could get his chopsticks on. Then he stopped, listening curiously - he heard Sanji's voice, but he knew it wasn't actually Sanji, because he was still in the kitchen. He glanced up at the TV and hit pause on the remote, eyes widening, mouth dropping open. "Sanji! You've got some explaining to do!" he called out.

Sanji popped his head into the room, looking curiously at Zoro. His eyes slid up as if in slow motion and lit on the TV, an expression of horror creeping over his face. In the next moment, he was moving faster than Zoro had ever seen him move before as he dove for the remote, snatching it from Zoro and turning the TV off.

"What's your deal?" Zoro asked, laughing.

"Ugh, don't watch that."

"Why not?"

"It's embarrassing! I don't want to watch myself!" Sanji's hands came up to cover his face, which had started to turn suspiciously pink.

"Well _I_ want to see."

"I'll give you a hint: I won, now I'm here."

"You were on Top Chef and you won," Zoro said, grinning as he cupped his hands over Sanji's, trying to pry them away.

"It's embarrassing," Sanji repeated.

"Why is that embarrassing? You should be so proud of yourself."

Sanji's cheeks were hot and bright pink when Zoro finally managed to pull his hands away, holding him tightly by the wrists to keep him from doing it again.

"Sometimes it's so hard to remember that you're the same guy who used to make fun of me for the dumbest things," Sanji said.

Zoro shrugged. "I've always thought you were amazing," he blurted.

Sanji yanked away from Zoro's hands hard and was back to covering his cheeks, shaking his head. "Ugh. Why are you like that all the time!"

Eyes widening, Zoro grabbed Sanji's wrists once more, tugging on them childishly. "Like _what_?"

"So fucking, ugh, sincere and shit! It's so fucking _cute_ ," Sanji grumbled.

"I'm not _cute_ ," Zoro said, smacking his hands against Sanji's when he refused to drop them.

"You really _are_ , you always say these thoughtful things like it's nothing!"

"I like to make you smile," Zoro said, deciding that he'd curry more of Sanji's favor with kisses than with slappy hands. He pressed his lips to each of Sanji's knuckles, and his hands finally started to loosen.

"See! You just did it again." He peeked up at Zoro through his fingers, then let them fall down to the sofa. "Fine. You can watch it, but one episode _only_ and you better not say anything!"

Zoro grinned, triumphant, and turned the TV back on once Sanji handed over the remote. They both readjusted themselves before digging in, bowls in one hand, chopsticks in the other.

The episode was halfway done, but from what Zoro could discern, they were cooking for naturists. All he knew was there was a lot of censoring.

"They were very nice people... it was eye-opening," Sanji said defensively.

"Being the only clothed person in a swarm of nudists? That's like the opposite of the being naked in front of a crowd dream, isn't it?"

Sanji laughed, shoving his shoulder warningly against Zoro's.

"Was it harder to ignore the fact that they were naked or to work around their diets?" Zoro asked. His tone was a combination of curiosity and taunting.

"Would you stop! It was all fine!"

Zoro went quiet as he watched Sanji work onscreen. He obviously wasn't trying to show off - he could be doing the exact thing in Zoro's kitchen right now - but there was such an ease of movement, an effortless ability to bring everything together, that it was stunning.

His final plate held seared scallops with béchamel sauce, resting in a bed of fresh barley salad. It wasn't something wildly complex like some of the other contestants made, but Zoro felt himself smile in pride when the judges declared it as a favorite.

"It wasn't my best," Sanji said, breaking the silence.

"I'd eat it."

"You'd eat anything I put in front of you."

"That's because you've never made anything that wasn't delicious."

"You're just going to favor me because you've eaten my food before. Some of them were incredible, it's a miracle I won against them."

"Yeah, whatever. They make those goofy foams and all that bullshit, I like you just because you don't."

Sanji made a pleased noise though his face was bashful, and continued to eat from his bowl without speaking.

It was almost kind of hilarious how Sanji acted onscreen, since it was pretty clear to Zoro that he was uncomfortable but covering it up with his charisma. The only time he saw Sanji shining completely through was at judging: he watched fear streak across Sanji's features, then bleed away to pleasure, but he was always humble.

For dessert, Sanji put together a lemon berry cake with mascarpone sandwiched between, garnished with powdered sugar, raspberry drizzle, and a perfect duo of blueberry and raspberry perched on top, curls of lemon rind dusted over them.

"I want to eat that," Zoro said around his chopsticks. He'd gotten so caught up in watching that he wasn't really focusing on what he was eating anymore, though his taste buds distantly registered that it was delicious.

"You hate sweets."

Zoro nodded in concession. "But I bet it'd still be good."

"You know what's kind of funny?" Sanji asked.

"Hm?"

"So many of them freak out about having to prepare desserts. They fly into a fucking panic."

"You've been baking since you were eleven," Zoro said. "It's just innate for you."

"Zeff never let me second-guess myself. Everything had to be finished to the end. If it turned out bad, I'd learned a lesson. If it was good, I'd have to do even better next time. It's because of him that I could win."

Zoro smiled, placing his bowl down with one hand and reaching the other over to wrap around Sanji's hand. "Or maybe it's because you're a damn good cook."

Sanji swallowed hard and shook his head. "He gave me so much. He took me in, he taught me everything he knew, he encouraged me. Every ounce of ability I have is because of him."

"But you have natural talent too."

"Well, that's just the barest advantage. Talent isn't worth anything if you don't surround it with effort and knowledge."

"You care too, though. You pay attention. For instance, why do you make so many Japanese dishes for me?" Zoro asked. "Not that I'm complaining."

Sanji shrugged. "I like to make you the things that you like."

"See? You're indiscriminate with food. You realize that not everyone likes the same things and you cater to it. I mean, how many culinary snobs do you see who act like French cuisine is the height of it? Or that only think a dish is a masterpiece if it looks like Picasso decided to sculpt with bits of lamb intestines and couscous? I like the way you treat food. All this cooking you've done for me, it's the best. It reminds me of home."

Sanji smiled at him, that gentle, comforting one that he smiled when he felt like he was taking care of people properly. "I'm glad. I wasn't sure if I was making all of it right."

"It's perfect." Zoro chugged down the last of his beer, then sat the empty can on the table with his dishes. "What did you do with the money you won, anyway?"

"Some of it paid for my bills from school, but most of it's in my savings. I want to open a restaurant eventually."

"Why not now?"

"I haven't found the right place... and I'm not sure if I'm ready, honestly."

"Why's that?"

"It's a lot of work, and you aren't guaranteed success. The idea of failing for me is... devastating." Sanji had finished his own meal, and was now sipping on his tea, knuckles white as they curled around the mug.

"But you'd be amazing. I can't imagine anyone hating your food."

Sanji shrugged, smiling self-deprecatingly. "I mean, I'm _gonna_ , eventually. I'm not so sure I'm going to fail that I'll give up my dream. In fact, I'm determined to see it through. I just have no fucking clue how to run a business."

"Kuina's wife owns a bar. She could probably help you out, tell you how to get the ball rolling."

"Kuina is _married_?" Sanji asked, mouth dropping open.

"Yeah. Her wife is uh... a lot older than her. She's got plenty of experience with the whole business thing."

"How long have they been married?"

"About four years now? Let's see, they got married in February, so..." Zoro paused, counting on his fingers. "Yeah, a couple months away from four years."

"Wow. It's so weird when people your age start getting married..." Sanji said, a look of mixed horror and confusion on his face.

Zoro laughed. "I think it's normal to feel that way when you're right out of high school and everyone is getting married or having kids, but we're in our late twenties now. It's pretty much standard fare at this point."

"I can't even imagine going for that until I've started to accomplish my goals."

"They do say love doesn't wait. One year Kuina's all about becoming the international kendo champion, the next she's getting fitted for dresses and coordinating swatches. She still has her goal, she just has someone along with her now that wants to share that experience too."

Sanji leaned his head against Zoro's shoulder and smiled up at him. "That's a nice sentiment."

"I think it's possible to balance the two," Zoro said, pressing his lips to Sanji's forehead.

They were quiet and content until the episode ended, when they gathered up the dishes and washed them together, Sanji's arms deep in the soapy water as Zoro dried everything passed to him.

"I need a nap," Zoro muttered as soon as they were done.

"Yeah, go on, I'll wake you up in a couple hours. What time do you work tomorrow?"

"I gotta be in at nine."

"Mm, alright," Sanji said. His back was turned to Zoro as he wiped up stray droplets of water from the counter, and Zoro took just a moment to admire the flex of his shoulders underneath his hoodie.

"Are you staying?" he asked.

"Yeah, I will if you want." Sanji folded the towel and tucked it into the handle of the stove, then followed Zoro through the dining room.

"That'd be good," said Zoro. They trailed toward the stairs, turning off all the lights and locking up behind themselves. There was a miniscule fight over the bathroom, and ten minutes later they were all settled in bed. Zoro tried to keep his eyes open for as long as he could, watching Sanji's silhouette against the lamp as he read, but it barely took him five minutes to fall into unconsciousness.

* * *

The sun was shining into the bedroom when Sanji woke him up. "I let you sleep in," he whispered. "I'm covering breakfast today so I have to get out of here, but I made some oatmeal for you. It's sitting on the stove, so get to it soon or it'll go cold."

Zoro nodded, pushing himself up slowly. He felt cheated at not getting to spend as much time with Sanji as possible, but tried to reason that there'd be more days to come.

"Thanks," he said, voice lower than usual from sleep.

"Yeah," Sanji replied, leaning in to give Zoro a quick kiss. "Bye."

"Wait," Zoro said. "Keep the spare key... just in case."

Sanji's mouth dropped open a little before turning into a pleased smile. "Okay. Thanks."

"Mm."

"Bye," Sanji said again as he left the room, and a few moments later, Zoro heard the front door close and lock downstairs.

* * *

The first week of December came and went, and with it, Tashigi's panic over the break-in. They'd determined nothing of value was taken apart from her laptop, though the higher-ups were very concerned about the security leak.

Smoker had been strangely helpful in keeping her out of the panic pitfalls, even going so far as to drag her from the office for lunch one day when the signs of overwhelm started to show in her.

There was just too much going on for Zoro and Sanji to see each other during the week. The most they'd managed was when Zoro showed up at the Baratie for lunch on Wednesday, and even then, Sanji had only gotten a short break. They had about five minutes to sit together, Zoro eating sausage and spinach pasta gratin while Sanji talked and fidgeted with his pack of cigarettes. At the very least, Zoro had gotten about ten minutes to catch up with Zeff again when he popped his head out of the kitchen to call Sanji back in.

In the meantime, they did plenty of texting, rarely anything of importance, just trading daily happenings, goodnights, good mornings. Zoro had at last entered the no-man's land of being unsure if it was socially acceptable to say _I miss you_ yet, but Sanji's final text on Friday evening had been both a reassurance that they'd see each other the next day and a confession that he had missed Zoro, so that had kept him smiling throughout the rest of the night.

They got to spend the whole of Saturday together. Sanji showed up early, using his new key to let himself in and make breakfast before Zoro had even woken up, then had come upstairs and drawn him out of sleep with an almost agonizingly teasing blowjob, leaving Zoro panting and clawing at the sheets. After lunch, Zoro took a good long nap while Sanji read, and then there was a late dinner of tacos and tequila. And because they were still wide awake and drunk in the middle of the night, they walked down to the convenience store for ice cream and Doritos. There was something about it that just brought Zoro right back to being sixteen. It was so _normal_ , but it was also something Zoro found himself treasuring. Sometimes it was almost like they weren't even dating, like it was only the natural state of being for them.

Sunday morning they spent an hour touching each other after waking, feeling out scars and ticklish spots and the places that felt nothing. Zoro discovered that Sanji liked to be kissed behind his ear, that his nipples were particularly sensitive, and that if he really wound him up, Sanji would let him pull his hair. And Sanji discovered that Zoro liked to be able to bend him in half, that he would flush and moan the harder Sanji pressed against the dimples at the base of his spine, and that he got off on saying filthy things. It was far from a complete sexual index, but it was a start.

This was everything Zoro had ever wanted, and more that he'd never even imagined. For all that he'd thought about getting to kiss Sanji, or getting to touch him, even waking up next to him, he hadn't thought of all the small, simple things that made every day a pleasure.

To top it all off, before leaving, Sanji had placed a copy of his own apartment key in Zoro's hand, saying that he wouldn't mind if Zoro wanted to use it. He'd gone to work later that day with a smile on his face, and he could feel Smoker glowering at him every time he passed the open door to his office.

On Tuesday, Kuina and Zoro met up for lunch at some sushi place she'd demanded they go to. Her hair was covered up with a beanie and she had a scarf wrapped around the bottom half of her face, so he barely recognized her until she grabbed him by the sleeve and pulled him down for a hug. It was always funny to him how short she was now, because when they were younger, she'd seemed to tower above him. Now, he was just under a foot taller than she was.

They got out of the cold quickly and were seated, and after ordering drinks, he rested his arms on the table, wondering how to broach the topic.

"How's things?" he finally asked. Though they communicated pretty regularly, she was always more talkative in person, which meant he actually never knew what was going on with her beyond the important shit.

"Good! Everything at the dojo is going well. We got a new group of kids in and they're all chaos, but it's nice," she said, folding together their straw wrappers into a little accordion.

"How's dad?"

Kuina rolled her eyes, and Zoro prepared to hear what for. "Ugh, he's dad. You know how he is, putting that empty smile up all the time. I just wish he'd fucking tell me I'm doing a good job once in a while. Not that I need his approval or anything, but..."

Zoro knew. This was old hat, and the fact that he sided with her over it was old hat too. He'd comforted her after these kinds of incidents more often than he could count.

"I guess it's just like, no matter how good he sees I am, no matter how many competitions I win, he still thinks I'm inferior somehow." She was starting to look downtrodden, and Zoro reached over, squeezing her hand tightly.

"There's not a damn thing wrong with you, it's all on him. Not only are you an amazing teacher, there's no one I've met that's as skilled as you are at kendo." It went without saying that she had an incredible amount of natural talent, too. He'd come close to beating her so many times, but had never yet delivered the proverbial finishing blow. He was intimately familiar with every single one of her moves, how she carried herself, her weaknesses, and still he couldn't _win_. He knew for a fact just how committed she was to their art, and knew also that he'd always had to work harder just to end up worse than her. He was proud of her, but it was a thorn in his side. At this rate, he'd never be the best.

"He still wishes you'd taken over, I think," she said, murmuring her thanks as the waitress put their drinks down, and they paused to order. Once the waitress had walked away, she resumed right where she'd left off. "He thinks the kids would respect a man more."

"Most kids these days are raised by parents a lot more liberal than our dad, especially in the city," Zoro said, taking a sip of his beer. One thing could be said about these little sushi restaurants Kuina was obsessed with, and that was the nostalgia of beer from their homeland. "A lot of them don't think twice about a woman teaching them, and if they do, you won't let it slide. Besides, he knows that's not what I wanted to do with my life. No matter how much I love kendo, I'd still be a shitty teacher."

Kuina smiled at him brightly, her mood on the rise. "Thanks, little brother."

"Yeah, yeah."

They were halfway through the meal when he finally just gave up on tact and came out with it. "So hey, guess who I saw... have been seeing... am seeing?"

"Who?" she asked, piece of tekkamaki halfway to her mouth.

"Sanji."

She paused, eyes wide. "Sanji Black?"

"Have we ever known any other Sanji?" he asked.

"No, but... I thought he was in France."

"Apparently he and Zeff came back."

"Wow. _Wait_ , seeing him as in romantically?" She had fumbled her chopsticks, dropping the sushi back on the plate. It seemed not to have phased her all that much though, because she abandoned it in favor of hounding Zoro.

"Yeah."

"Uh, okay, are we sure this is the same Sanji and he hasn't been, I don't know, turned into a robot? Replaced by an alien?"

"I mean, some things about him are different but... he's grown up a lot, according to Ace," said Zoro after a sip of beer. He, at the very least, had continued his meal rather than gawking.

"Ace knows him?"

"Yeah, for like four years now."

"Huh. That's so weird."

"Trust me, I know."

Suddenly, Kuina's face split wide with a grin. "Oh, I just remembered your awful crush on him!"

Zoro felt his cheeks heat and he shook his head, turning his face into his shoulder. He'd been hoping his sister wasn't going to give him a ton of grief for it, but obviously he'd expected too much.

"That little crestfallen look you'd get on your face when he hung out with his other friends," she guffawed. "And how upset you were when you came back from visiting him before France! And how guilty you were about kissing him while he was drunk!" She was laughing almost too hard to speak.

"Shut the hell up, you're making a scene!"

She wiped the tears from her eyes and sighed long and loud. "Oh, this is just too good. Are you still trailing after him like a puppy?"

"I'll have you know we have a relationship full of balanced affection," he muttered indignantly.

"Yeah, okay. So you carry his grocery bags for him and he says 'thanks' once in awhile?"

"He's really nice... we get along a lot better than we used to, and he just... I don't know. He makes me happy."

"Oh god, you're getting that gooey look on your face." She stuck her tongue out and made heaving motions like she was about to throw up. Despite the two years she had on him in age, she still acted like an eight year old most of the time.

"Shut up, I am not."

"How long have you two been seeing each other then?" she asked, finally picking her sushi back up.

"Almost a month now. He was the reason I didn't come to Thanksgiving dinner."

"Getting pretty serious there," she said with a tutting noise at the end.

Zoro rolled his eyes. "Shakky proposed to you after you'd been dating for two and a half months."

"That's different. You know what they say about lesbians."

"Hmm, no. What's that?"

"Our relationships move at the fastest pace. What's _your_ excuse?"

"For one, I'm not planning our goddamn wedding. For another, we've known each other twenty-three years. We didn't really need time to get to know each other, it's more like a continual state of catching up."

"Makes sense, even if it doesn't keep me from worrying that you're jumping into it," she said, finishing off the last of her sushi. "Well anyway, I wish you luck."

Zoro laughed. "Yeah, thanks."

After paying, they stood outside in the cold and she turned her face up to him, a look of thought on it.

"Hey," she said. "Let's go to lunch again soon. Next week. And bring Sanji."

"Or we could go to lunch at the Baratie."

"That's cute, there's no way in hell you're going to get a reservation there for any time in the next _month_ at least."

"He's the sous chef," said Zoro nonchalantly.

She paused, pressing her lips together.

"There's always a table reserved for me," he continued. In actuality, it was the chef's table which Zeff rarely used, so it almost always housed Sanji's friends.

"Arrogant!"

"Do you want me to call him right now and ask?"

"Yeah," she said, eyes narrowed in challenge as if she didn't believe him.

He hit Sanji's speed dial and put it on speakerphone, and they stood there in the freezing cold waiting for an answer. The longer it took, the wider Kuina smiled.

"Hey, sorry, hands full. What's up?" answered Sanji at last.

"Kuina wants to have lunch with us sometime next week," Zoro said.

"That's fine. Where at?"

"There," Zoro said.

"Mm, okay. How about Wednesday? The old man will be here, so he can take over the kitchen."

Kuina was starting to turn pale.

"Sure, that's good."

"Alright. Tell her I'll be looking forward to it!"

"Yeah, I'm sure she is too," Zoro said, grinning wickedly at her.

"Oh, real quick, what days do you have off this week?"

"Saturday and Sunday."

"Oh, our weekends coincide again for a change. Can I come over?"

Zoro tried not to show how pleased he was with being asked that, quickly thumbing off the speakerphone and putting it up to his ear, but from the way Kuina was starting to look vaguely shark-like, he could tell that it was kind of useless.

"Definitely. I gotta go now though, we're standing out in the cold and she looks like she's getting way too much dirt on me."

"Okay, go get warm. Talk to you later."

They hung up, and the second his phone was back in his pocket, Kuina was on him. She leapt into his arms and wiggled like a fish, and Zoro almost had trouble holding her up.

"That's so fucking _cute_!" she yelled against his head.

"Shaddup!" he said, fighting to get her away. She dropped back to the ground after a few more seconds of flailing wildly, but not before pinching his cheeks so hard it stung.

"You got me reservations at the Baratie through your fucking _boyfriend_ and it turns out you're precious together despite being the bane of each other's existence as kids. That's fucking _great_."

"How does your wife not know you're a terrible person yet?" Zoro asked.

Kuina cackled. "Oh trust me, she's always known, and she's just as bad as I am. If she were here, she'd be asking about your sex life, so feel grateful."

"I don't have to feel grateful for shit. Anyway, I gotta get over to work," Zoro said, and they did all the awkward sibling hugging and _love you_ s before parting ways.

* * *

Zoro had been looking forward to the end of another busy week, and not just because Sanji would eventually show up, though Zoro couldn't fucking wait for that either. No, mostly he just wanted his two consecutive days of doing nothing at all so he could fill them with naps, food, and hopefully, sex.

So he was almost more pissed than worried when he got home Friday just before midnight and flipped on the hallway light to find a piece of paper taped to the bannister of the stairs. He crept closer, snatching it up as if it were a wild animal about to bolt at any second.

' _Homemade tomato soup and grilled cheese in the fridge ;) keep the sandwich in the foil and put it in the oven at 350 for eight minutes. Soup microwaved for two minutes. Eat before you come upstairs!_ '

A little bit of calm washed through him at the realization that it was only Sanji, and he did as the note said, eating quickly at the bar without even bothering to put anything on actual dishes. After, he tossed the tin foil in the sink and the tupperware and spoon in the trash, and was halfway across the room before he realized his mistake and turned back to correct it.

Then it was up the stairs three at a time. He nudged the bedroom door open, and upon noticing the lights were off, intentionally quieted his footfalls. It only took a moment for him to strip out of his uniform before he crawled into bed.

Sanji was on his stomach, eyes closed and breath puffing his hair out slightly every couple seconds. Zoro just looked at him for a moment, fondness creeping through his chest, before he leaned over and pressed a kiss to the arch of one shoulder. Then he scooted closer, fitting himself into the curve of Sanji's stomach as the small spoon.

"Oh... you're home," Sanji said after a second, and Zoro would deny that he jumped a little in fright.

"Yeah. Thanks for the leftovers."

He hummed, settling his arm over Zoro's waist and nuzzling closer so that Zoro could feel his breath on the back of his neck. "No problem," he said.

It took them no time at all to fall asleep, comfortable as they were, and even as the sun came over the horizon and made itself comfortable in the sky, they still didn't rise. When they finally did, it was closer to lunchtime than breakfast time, and that apparently made Sanji antsy.

"I want a burrito," was the first thing he said to Zoro upon noticing he was awake.

"Good morning to you too."

"Let's go get Qdoba."

"Ugh," groaned Zoro, stretching his arms up above his head and letting free a yawn. "I don't want to go all the way to Manhattan."

"We'll just go to the Village and come right back, I promise," Sanji wheedled.

"Yeah, that's half an hour either way, plus walking time, plus having to deal with every other asshole who woke their boyfriend up this morning with ' _I want a burrito_ '," he lifted his voice up, mimicking Sanji obnoxiously, "plus their angry boyfriend who really planned on not leaving bed today."

Sanji squawked and tackled him. "I don't sound like that, bastard!"

"But you don't deny that you're an asshole!"

"I am! I don't care! I care more about having a burrito than about being an asshole!"

Zoro dropped Sanji on his back, pinching his nipple hard. Sanji let out an abrupt moan and looked very angry at himself for it. "That isn't fair!"

"What isn't fair is that I'm not going to get to eat my chef's food for lunch."

Sanji grinned triumphantly. "So you'll go with me?"

"Ugh. Yes," Zoro mumbled, collapsing onto Sanji's chest.

"Don't sound so upset, you'll get food out of it," Sanji said. He patted Zoro on the shoulder in what was probably meant to be a reassuring manner, but mostly just felt patronizing, so Zoro bit him on the chest in retaliation.

"What the hell was that for!" Sanji yelled, swatting at Zoro's head.

"You're a brat."

"You're a jerk."

"You're a loser."

"You're immature!"

"You're not as cool as you think you are," Zoro said with a smirk. It seemed his favorite childhood pastime of name-calling was still enjoyable all these years later, and better yet, Sanji was just as susceptible to it.

"And you're an old man in a mildly attractive body!" Sanji said, scraping his nails over the back of Zoro's head.

He had to fight not to make a pleased noise at the feeling. "What's that make you, a geriatrophile?"

Sanji's face curled up in distaste. "I don't want to date you anymore."

"Yeah?" Zoro asked. "Starting to feel guilty about grave-robbing?"

"Shut up! I just realized I don't actually like you!"

"Kinda late for that now," Zoro said, kicking at Sanji's foot, which had steadily been creeping between his calves.

"Hmph. I'll just take you to lunch and disappear after, then you'll end up lost and I'll never see you again," said Sanji, kicking Zoro back.

"I don't get that lost anymore."

"Fine. I'll call in my unsavory gang of miscreants and get them to make you disappear."

Zoro laughed. "You don't have a gang."

Sanji smiled and curled his fingers around the shell of Zoro's ears. "Nah, of course I don't. What kind of shitty gang member would date a police officer?"

"Hm, one who thinks I'm irresistable."

"I hope you don't think that way about yourself," Sanji said with a laugh.

"Nope, but you do."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes. Now get out of bed and let's go get lunch."

Zoro sighed and rolled out of bed, annoyed that his distraction tactics hadn't worked, but he let Sanji drag him through the process of taking a shower and getting dressed anyway.

Another two hours later, they arrived home, bellies full and Sanji satisfied, at the very least. Zoro wandered straight upstairs and dropped into bed for a good nap. At some point he awoke to Sanji curled around him, but he drifted back shortly after.

The sun reached its peak, then began to sink.

When Zoro woke again, it was a little bit past four and Sanji was staring at him sleepily.

"I never nap usually," he said, voice scratchy. "You just make it look so nice."

"Naps are the best," Zoro declared.

Sanji laughed and rolled up out of bed. "Of course you'd think so," he replied as he dug out a pair of yoga pants from his bag, changing into them quickly.

"What are you doing?" Zoro asked.

"Going to practice. You can come if you want," Sanji said, leaving the room.

Zoro made himself get up and pull on a pair of sweatpants, then dragged his feet down the hallway to enter the practice room.

"Do you ever stretch before you go through your motions?" Sanji asked, cracking open an eye from his perfect lotus pose.

"I meditate," Zoro said as he joined Sanji on the floor to do the same.

"You should stretch. I'll teach you, if you want."

Zoro thought about how much he really didn't care, then he thought about seeing Sanji's body twisted into impossible positions, or his hands guiding Zoro into place. "If you want, I guess."

They completed their pose, then Sanji guided him into bound angle. Zoro followed without even having to check, knowing it well. They held it, and from there Sanji switched into a seated forward bend. Zoro copied, and they held again.

Next, Sanji fell onto his back and moved into plow pose, torso almost perfectly vertical, legs coming down straight above his head. Zoro watched, gaping, as Sanji's thighs moved closer and closer to his face.

"Can you suck your own dick?" he blurted.

Sanji turned to look at him, one eyebrow cocked and grinning. "Yeah."

"No fucking way."

"I can show you if you don't believe me."

Zoro groaned, shaking his head. "You're going to, eventually, but we're busy right now." He moved into the same pose with some difficulty, unable to get his toes to touch the floor. Sanji told him to hold anyway, so he did despite the uncomfortable pull.

They released, took a moment to breathe, then Sanji led him into wheel pose, which was also kind of painful for Zoro. Next was the extended triangle, and they repeated on both sides before ending with hand under foot.

"There, now you're all loose," Sanji sighed, standing back up.

He might have been loose, but it was in the way where his limbs had gone into jello territory rather than open and warmed-up. His muscles ached, and he felt kind of annoyed about it; he lifted weights plenty often, but apparently some of these muscles never got used. And Sanji had worked him hard enough that he hadn't even gotten a moment to admire all of his contortions, so that was one more thing to feel cheated about.

"Fight with me," Sanji said, and Zoro paused for a moment, debating with himself before agreeing.

He moved to the sword rack and carefully removed Sandai Kitetsu and Shusui, fingers tracing reverently over the saya by habit. When he stood, Sanji had put on a pair of tennis shoes and was lowering himself from a standing split.

Zoro took a deep breath, and removed the katana from their saya.

Sanji rushed him. He barely had time to lift them both before Sanji's foot was arcing through the air toward his face.

He lifted, blocking clumsily, and immediately landed on his ass. Sanji'd fucking _tricked_ him, feinting to sweep Zoro's feet out from under him instead of going for the face like Zoro thought.

Pushing back to his feet, he steeled himself and narrowed his eyes. When Sanji came at him this time, he was ready, meeting the roundhouse kick with the back edge of Shusui while striking out with Sandai Kitetsu. He caught Sanji hard in the side with its back edge, and Sanji coughed out a breath.

Before he could get his breathing back in order, Zoro rapped him across the side with one sword, the other held up in case Sanji got any ideas. And he definitely did, lifting his leg up and bringing it down hard into Zoro's shoulder. It did its desired job of knocking Zoro off balance and of giving Sanji some time to recover.

He had to get in close, Zoro realized. If Sanji wasn't far enough away to get momentum with his leg, he couldn't do any damage.

So that's what he did, forcing in under Sanji's guards and hitting him across the sternum with Shusui. Or at least, he'd planned to, but then Sanji leapt backwards, sprung onto his hands and aimed both feet into Zoro's stomach.

There was no way he could block in time. He saw it coming, yet he was helpless to stop it. And when it landed, it knocked him right into the wall.

He slid slowly down, looking dazedly up at Sanji.

"You're still holding back," Sanji said, dusting his hands off.

He coughed and slid an arm around to hold his stomach.

Sanji reached a hand down to help him up and he took it. When he glanced behind himself, there was a clear indent of his body in the wall.

* * *

Dinner was Sanji's chicken and dumplings with an icepack apiece on Sanji's side and Zoro's stomach.

They were camped out on the sofa once again, watching Fight Club. The irony didn't escape either of them.

"Sorry for breaking your wall," Sanji apologized for about the third time now.

"Seriously. It's just a fucking wall. I'm more concerned about the fact that you rearranged my intestines with your feet."

"That's what you get for taking me lightly, bastard," Sanji glowered.

"I'm going to shove my sword so far up your ass next time-"

"Not if I stick my foot down your throat first-"

"Fucking try it, shitty cook, I'll cut your damn legs off-"

"I'd like to see you try, moss-for-brains, after I break your skull with a frying pan-"

They paused, turned to each other, and both let out an awkward chuckle.

"I guess we haven't _completely_ grown out of our old ways," Sanji admitted.

Zoro had long past figured that out by now but he nodded as he cut a dumpling in half and popped it into his mouth. "I think we're handling it a little better than we did when we were younger."

"I don't want it to be like that all the time again," Sanji said quietly a few minutes later.

Zoro put his fork down and turned to look at Sanji. "I don't think it will be. It feels a lot less like we're at each other's throats these days and more like particularly vicious flirting."

Sanji laughed. "That's the only way I know how to flirt."

"Trust me, I've noticed."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?!" Sanji cried, leaping onto him. Zoro had to hold his plate up above his head to keep it from falling onto Sanji.

"Nothing, it's very endearing."

"I'll show you _endearing_ ," Sanji announced. He took Zoro's plate from his hands, put it on the table and proceeded to kiss Zoro into submission.

"How was that endearing?" Zoro asked several minutes later.

"I don't like you."

"I like you." But what he really meant was _I love you_.

Sanji smiled up at him. "I like you too." And Zoro could almost pretend the fond way he said it was him saying _I love you too_.

* * *

Sunday began with pain and horror. There was a crick in Zoro's neck from the arm of the sofa digging into it, something was pushing his spine up, his foot had been shoved into the gap between the back of the sofa and the cushions, and that wasn't even factoring in the ache from yesterday's impromptu yoga session.

He opened his eyes slowly. The living room was bright, the TV was still on (but muted), and Sanji's head was resting on his chest, arms wrapped under him and legs tangled between his.

"Sanji," he groused.

Sanji didn't move.

" _Sanji_ ," he said, louder this time.

Sanji stirred and took his time in gazing up at Zoro.

"My back is fucking killing me," Zoro said.

Sanji frowned, wiped at his eyes. "I'm seriously really sorry."

"Make it up to me by bringing me breakfast."

"You only have bread and eggs."

"Whatever."

Sanji stood slowly and stretched, shirt lifting up to show the barest hint of stomach and happy trail. Zoro smiled as he closed his eyes again, listening to Sanji start to move around the kitchen, and soon the clash of pots and pans had lulled him back to sleep.

When he got up for the second time, Sanji had placed a breakfast sandwich on the coffee table and left a post-it on his forehead which, once he pulled it off, simply read ' _showering_.'

He sat up gingerly and grabbed the plate along with the remote. As he took his first bite, he unmuted the TV, which was showing a re-run of some show about two brothers fighting demons, and he settled in with that despite knowing nothing that was going on.

Sanji came down and rejoined him after half an hour, and they finished the episode in silence, staying on the channel as yet another came on.

They were interrupted from their unexpected marathon around three in the afternoon, when Sanji's phone pinged with a text. He glanced at it, typed a little, looked back at the TV. Then it pinged again, he read, typed, and went back to watching. Once more it pinged, and he took a breath, blew it out and said, "Hey. I don't want to cut our weekend short but I have to go meet someone."

"Mm, who?" Zoro asked, taking his eyes off the screen.

"Can't tell you," Sanji said with a wink.

"Why not?" Zoro asked, deciding to play along.

"It's a secret!"

"Tell me."

"It has something to do with a certain holiday in a week and a half."

Zoro sighed, flopping onto his back. "Okay. Are you going to come back?"

"I don't think so. I have to go all the way out to Staten Island to meet this guy, and I work early tomorrow."

Zoro grumbled internally. "Alright," he sighed, getting up from the couch. His back had lessened in pain, but it still felt stiff, so he probably looked exactly like an old man as he stood up.

Sanji ran up to the bedroom to grab his bag, and Zoro waited by the stairs for him to get back down. Once he did, they took several moments to kiss goodbye, and when Zoro finally pulled back, he couldn't stop himself from saying it again. "I like you."

Sanji smiled, catching on immediately. "I like you too," he murmured, pressing a final kiss to Zoro's lips.

* * *

On Wednesday, Zoro met Kuina outside of the Baratie just before one. The place was bustling, crammed with people, and the girl who always worked the podium (he now knew her name was Keimi, and she recognized him as Sanji's boyfriend - though when Sanji had told her, Zoro had been afraid her eyes would pop out of her head from sheer shock) smiled and pointed him back, as if he needed the help.

(He did, but he wouldn't tell anyone.)

Sanji was already sitting in the booth, playing something on his phone when they sat down. Zoro slid in beside him, and Kuina took the opposite seat.

"Hello, Sanji," she greeted.

"Hi Kuina. You're looking lovely as ever," Sanji said as he put away his phone.

"Don't patronize me."

"Sharp-tongued as ever, too," Sanji murmured, smiling ever so slightly. He turned to Zoro, giving him a quick kiss hello.

"So I hear you've reeled my loser brother in," Kuina started, and Zoro prepared to hear high hell. "That's all well and good. He seems very happy with you. But if you put a single fucking toe out of line, I swear to god, I'll castrate you, and I won't stop there. I will cut your heart out and have your own father serve both it and your balls up on a plate with a nice bedding of romaine, sprinkled with salt and pepper."

"I think they'd look better pureed and used as a sauce on ice cream, but I know you're traditional," Sanji suggested, fiddling with his lighter.

"I like the way you think. I'll save a little for the dessert," she said, smiling sharply at him.

Nojiko, who had been standing there since halfway into Kuina's tirade, didn't even miss a beat. "What will we be having to drink with the internal organs?" she asked.

"Stella," said Zoro.

"Stella," said Kuina.

"Water, please," said Sanji.

Nojiko nodded and walked away. They all took a few moments to decide on their meals, then delved into conversation.

"So what have you been up to since we lost track of you?" Kuina asked Sanji, apparently done with her confrontations.

"Moved to France. Finished school. Went to culinary school, graduated. Worked at a two-starred restaurant in Paris for a year. Moved back here, opened this place with the old man. And that's about it."

Kuina nodded, looking mildly satisfied with his explanation. "And exactly how much dating have you done since moving away?"

"Serious dating? None."

She stroked her chin, nodding slowly. " _Interesting_."

Zoro hissed at her to stop, but she kept going.

"On a scale from one to bi-weekly STD testing, how sexually active would you say you were?"

"Bi-monthly."

" _Very interesting_ ," she said, stroking her chin faster.

Nojiko returned with drinks and took their orders, then Kuina continued.

"What do you think about being in a serious relationship with Zoro?" she asked.

"What the hell is with the fucking third degree?" Zoro demanded, trying to head it off before Sanji could say anything.

"I think it's one of the best decisions I ever made," Sanji replied.

"Very, very interesting," Kuina said, and pulled out her phone to type into it at a rather furious pace.

Zoro found himself gaping a little, even when Sanji looked at him and smiled as if nothing at all were wrong.

"I heard you got married. Congratulations," Sanji said when Kuina turned her attention back to them.

"Oh, thank you!" she said with a genuinely warm smile.

"Done reading him the riot act?" Zoro asked as she turned back down to answer a text.

"For now, I guess."

"So I was thinking," Kuina began. "We should all have Christmas together this year. Like old times."

"That's... actually a good idea," Zoro said.

"Or would that be weird? Why'd you two have to meet again a month before Christmas, don't you know how awkward it is to have to decide whether or not it's normal to spend Christmas together after just a month?"

"I don't think it's weird," Sanji said.

"It's not weird," Zoro agreed.

"Well, we'll work it out then. I'll talk to our dad... You talk to your dad, Sanji."

"Good luck tearing him away from the doctor," Zoro said with a smirk. Sanji scowled and shoved him hard enough that he nearly fell out of the booth.

Conversation lessened as their meals arrived, and by the time they were all finished, they'd worked out that Sanji would host it in his apartment, since it had the biggest living room, and that they'd shoot for around ten in the morning Christmas day. Kuina did plenty of threatening once she realized that Sanji wasn't going to let her bring anything for breakfast, and he'd almost caved out of pure amusement.

Once the bill had been paid, Sanji walked them out of the building, and Zoro had to stifle a laugh as Sanji blushed brightly when Kuina leaned up for a hug.

"It was really good to see you again, Sanji," she said, pressing a kiss to his cheek. "We all missed you a lot."

Sanji was practically speechless, and she just giggled as she gave Zoro a hug too before heading on her way.

"Alright, I gotta get to work, lover boy," Zoro said, getting his own kiss in. Sanji's fingers wrapped tightly around his wrist and held him there.

"I like you," he said.

"I like you too," said Zoro, giving Sanji one more kiss.

The whole ride back to Brooklyn, Zoro found himself lost in thought, trying to figure out what the perfect gift for Sanji would be now that he knew they'd be spending Christmas together.

It was going to take divine intervention, he knew, and he made plans to steal a certain phone number from Sanji's phone next time he got ahold of it.


	5. Go Places

Zoro laid still and silently awake for what seemed like half an hour after Sanji had fallen asleep. And while he doubted Sanji would wake up, or that he'd be that upset if he did, Zoro wanted to be sneaky about this. So once he was entirely sure that Sanji was down for the count, he snuck around the bed as stealthily as he could and grabbed up Sanji's phone to scroll through the contacts, one eye on Sanji at all times to make sure he was still out.

The name was second from the bottom of the list, but before he got there, he paused on another. No actual name, just the letter ' _S_.' He wasn't a nosy kind of person, and respected Sanji's right to have friends that he didn't know. But in that moment, a curiosity washed through him so strong that he almost tapped on that letter.

Instead, he forced himself to keep scrolling, copied the number he was looking for into his own phone, locked Sanji's, and slipped back around to his side of the bed.

The next morning, Zoro went straight from Sanji's to work, after a quick breakfast and a shower taken alone. During his lunch break, he made several phone calls in quick succession. The first was to that new Thai restaurant that Sanji had mentioned, reservations for the 23rd around seven in the evening.

The second was to Robin, making plans to meet up on Saturday morning to go shopping (he shuddered in disgust) for something to wear to the restaurant.

The third call was to the number he'd taken from Sanji's phone. He traced his index finger repeatedly over a crack on the surface of his desk as it rang and rang.

"The hell's this?" answered a gruff voice on the other end.

"Hey old man, it's Zoro," he said.

"Ah! What do you need, boy?"

"Sanji probably talked to you about Christmas..."

"No, but go ahead," said Zeff, not even missing a beat.

"I have no idea what the hell to get him," Zoro sighed. "I know he'd appreciate kitchen shit, but I don't know where to begin with that."

"I'll let you in on something," Zeff said magnanimously. "He's had the same set of knives since he was a teenager. Sentimental value or some bullshit. Now there's nothing wrong with those knives. I bought them for him myself. But they're getting old now, and he has to sharpen them constantly. I'm sure if you wanted to get him some really nice ones, he'd be happy."

Zoro pulled a piece of paper closer to himself, pen poised. An idea had popped into his head, but he'd need Shakky's help for it. "What kind of knives does he already have?"

Zeff gave him a list of all the knives that Sanji kept and detailed the kinds of things he should be looking for in a new set, and Zoro wrote them down dutifully. He thanked Zeff and they eventually said goodbye, but not before doing a little bit more bullshitting.

Zoro took a pause then, to send a text to Sanji saying not to make any plans for the 23rd, and another to Usopp calling in a favor.

His final call was to Shakky.

"Hello little brother," she answered tiredly after several rings. She'd probably been asleep, and Zoro took a moment to feel bad for it.

"That bladesmith you know," he began, sure that the longer he wasted her time, the more likely she'd be to take it out of his wallet. "He any good?"

"Best on the east coast," she replied.

"Could you get me in to see him? Today maybe? There's a pretty big gift I need to get for someone."

"Oh, your cook boyfriend?" she asked, suddenly sounding wide awake and very interested.

"Yeah. I want to get him a full new set of knives."

"Well, I'll call him up now and see if he can swing it. He owes me one, and now so do you."

"Uh, yeah, thanks," Zoro replied, though Shakky had already hung up.

She texted him half an hour later, giving him an address and a time. It meant he had to leave work early, but Tashigi was still functioning under the pretense that she needed to pay him back for the whole break-in incident, so she was quick to say she'd cover for him.

Around four, he found himself leaning over the shoulder of a short, gray-haired man as he flipped through a portfolio of his work.

"That one," Zoro said, reaching down to tap his finger against a picture of a santoku knife. It was beautifully forged, black steel with a blue wave-patterned hamon - almost like Sandai Kitetsu, if it had been a kitchen knife rather than a deadly weapon.

"Ohh, yes," said the bladesmith. "It's a traditional way of folding the blade from our home country." He paused to wink at Zoro. "You don't see the real thing much these days-"

"I know about it," Zoro said, impatient. "Can you make all of them like that?"

"Well, yes," the man said, looking a tinge insulted. "I've been doing this since before your mother was born, boy."

"Ah, so. The black and blue hamon," he began, and watched as the man started to write. "On high carbon stainless steel... with the cognac wood composite handle."

He took a moment, feeling like he was forgetting something, until it hit him. "Oh, and..." He took the pen from the man and sketched out the design Usopp had sent over to him as fulfilment of the favor. "Could you engrave this on the blades?"

"Certainly," the old man said, and Zoro handed over the list of knives Zeff had given him.

"How soon do you think you can do all of it?" Zoro asked nervously.

"Come back in three days. I'll have them ready for you."

"Thank you," Zoro said, relieved, and feeling like at least one thing was under control at this point.

* * *

Robin met up with him on Broadway, though it was so fucking crowded and he got turned around so easily that it ended up taking at least five phone calls just to ask _where_ she was again. And when he saw who she was with, he swore internally. Nothing was worse than shopping with Kuina. He'd thought he was getting off easy by enlisting Robin's help, but he should have known better than to think she'd show up without backup.

They took a few moments to figure out a plan of attack (though Zoro wasn't entirely sure why they needed a plan for shopping of all things) which he paid little attention to, and when Kuina started to pull him down the sidewalk by his collar, he stumbled and nearly fell flat on his face.

"Do you think I'm made of money or something?" he asked as they entered Hugo Boss and were swarmed by several attractively-dressed people.

"I've seen your pay stubs," Kuina said while Robin easily shooed off the crowd. "And it's not like you spend your money on anything. Don't you want to look nice for your _boyfriend_?"

"I'm sure our cook would appreciate it," Robin agreed.

Zoro sighed, and resigned himself to being fussed over by his sister and Robin.

What followed was the most profound hour of torture he'd ever experienced. No matter how many times he said he liked what they showed him, Robin would always find something else and Kuina would always proclaim it _better_. He didn't know how, but he finally just stopped reacting and let them work themselves through every possible combination of shirt and pants.

He wasn't so happy about having to try it all on though, or about having to model for them. Even worse was when the other patrons decided to start commenting on their epic datewear journey.

At long last, everyone could agree that they had found the perfect pants. An older woman had even proclaimed (she'd probably drank one too many cocktails over brunch) that they "made his dick look great!" He had slapped his hands over his face, more embarrassed than he'd probably ever been, and walked back toward the fitting rooms with the sound of Kuina's cackles spurring him on from behind.

After that, it was just picking out a shirt, but there were so many colors and types of collars that it gave him a headache. And it didn't help that he had to endure Robin and Kuina debating the merits of white versus green - would green clash too much with his hair? Would white be too plain? But a really deep green would be good, wouldn't it? At the very least, he wouldn't stain it. But white was a tradition! And on and on it went, until he closed his eyes and picked at random. He opened them to find that he'd pointed out something black and relatively casual, and they could all agree that it was acceptable - traditional, and it definitely wouldn't show stains.

Zoro was glad to be done with it, even if Kuina kept complaining that he was no fun. He almost felt a kind of relief at watching $500 drop from his bank account, if it just got him away from there.

* * *

His Christmas break didn't start until Sunday evening, and even then he'd had to go back to the Bronx and pick up the knives. The man showed him his work before Zoro paid, but it really wasn't necessary - just a glance told him that the perfect work he'd seen in the photographs was even better in person. The soft blue color of the hamon faded beautifully into the black steel, the face of the blades perfectly smooth except for the indents of Granton edges.

That and the little skull engraved in each one, a chef's toque perched on its head, goatee on its chin, a cigarette hanging out of its mouth, and the crossed knife and fork behind it. He ran his thumb over it and nodded, pleased.

"They're perfect," he said. He just hoped Sanji would think so too.

And he'd damn well better, considering Zoro had just laid down excess of a thousand dollars.

From there, he went immediately home. Since they'd made plans to spend break together, he and Sanji hadn't overkilled it by seeing each other all that much. Which meant that once again, he had to dig up something to eat rather than having it made for him. It was possible he was starting to be a little bit spoiled by Sanji's cooking.

After two trips of walking back and forth between the sofa and the fridge, occasionally glancing inside with the useless hope that something would appear, he gave up and munched on a crappy roll-up of wet turkey meat, a tortilla, and American cheese. It was disgusting, so he sat at the bar and texted Sanji saying so.

' _aw, poor zoro, having to eat food he doesn't want to eat,_ ' Sanji sent back. Zoro could feel the sarcasm even through text.

' _i don't think my digestive system is equipped to deal with this kind of food anymore._ '

' _do you want me to overnight you something good?_ '

' _or you can just come over and bring food with you._ '

' _it's so cute how you think i exist just to make you happy!_ '

' _well you do make me happy just by existing, but if you don't want to bring me food, that's alright._ ' Zoro chuckled, then, embarrassing though it was, he took a picture of himself looking exaggeratedly pouty and sent it to Sanji.

A few moments later, Sanji texted him back a picture of himself with one eyebrow raised and looking rather unimpressed, tongue poked out tauntingly.

' _i'd like nothing more than to bring you food but i have to do some inventory things tonight :(_ ' was the reply that followed.

Zoro pressed his lips together and sighed. It was fine, they'd see each other tomorrow, but he had to admit he'd be feeling a little more comfortable if Sanji was here.

* * *

They'd had a quick conversation via text messages over breakfast Monday morning, and ultimately decided to meet at Sanji's apartment around five thirty that evening. It was reassuring, in a way. Zoro'd had plenty of stress dreams the night before: one where dinner ended with food poisoning and Sanji breaking up with him over it, one where Sanji skipped out halfway through to go on a date with the waitress, and the strangest one of all, where Zoro had a live lobster dropped on his lap. They hadn't made much sense, which he guessed was the point of stress dreams, but it hadn't kept anxiety from beginning to creep up.

After all, it wasn't a coincidence that he'd made dinner plans for exactly one month after that night at Sanji's, when they'd agreed to enter into a Serious Adult Relationship. But Zoro also wasn't particularly the kind of person that celebrated things like this.

Not that relationships weren't important to him. He couldn't count the number of times he'd made pretty serious compromises for the sake of those he'd dated. There was the girlfriend who intended to be an actress and spent nearly all of her time in character, so that he never knew if he was dating her or her character, and that had just about been the weirdest two months in his life. Then there was the forceful vegan guy, who had lasted a total of a week before Zoro'd had enough of tofu and cabbage for the rest of his life. A man needed his meat. And there were the few long-distance relationships he'd had before discovering that he just wasn't the type of person who could deal with them.

The point was, he knew that Sanji was the kind of person who enjoyed celebrations. And if this was the only thing he had to compromise, he'd do it with pleasure. Besides, he felt maybe it wasn't exactly a ' _we've been together for an insubstantial amount of time_ ' anniversary so much as a ' _we've been together for any amount of time at all'_ anniversary. What Ace had said about Sanji never keeping people around for longer than a couple weeks had stuck in his mind. And so had Sanji admitting that he'd never been in a serious relationship before.

Zoro managed to be productive throughout the day despite his foreboding dreams, and it had the bonus of keeping his mind off of being nervous in the meantime. He'd paid the bills, wrapped some Christmas gifts, tossed his bedsheets into the washer, and by the time all that was done, the mail had come. That meant more bills to pay and more gifts to wrap, including the leather knife roll he'd ordered on Thursday. He took a few moments just to inspect it for any flaws, and finding none, he unrolled it, carefully put each knife in its sheath, then tucked them into their places. Since he wasn't the best gift wrapper on the planet (barely even passable), he put it in a bag with some tissue paper and placed it with the rest of the presents he'd be taking along to Sanji's that night.

At four, Zoro finished packing clothes and gifts, then took a quick shower and shaved off the stubble that had cropped up over the past day and a half.

The pants and shirt he'd bought that weekend had been sitting in his closet, not even out of their bags yet, but he finally extracted them and removed the tags. When he put them on, he felt kind of stifled. He must have been so distracted by wanting to be done with shopping that he hadn't even noticed they were kind of uncomfortable. The pants were very... snug. And the shirt wasn't nearly so form-fitting as to be strangling, but it was pretty close.

Then he noticed his biggest problem - he didn't own any dress shoes. The pair he'd worn to Kuina's wedding had disappeared somewhere in his house never to be found again. The longer he looked, the less he cared to find them, and eventually he just decided to wear his Chuck Taylors. Sanji was probably going to kick his ass and fuss about how he needed to learn to dress himself properly, but a part of him felt it was only justice. At least this way, he was wearing one thing that was comfortable.

He put on a few dabs of aftershave and stood in the mirror, staring at himself. It was okay... but he figured he could do more. There was a tin of pomade in the closet from one of his exes, and he experimentally dipped two fingers in, slicking it through his hair. The end result either made him look vaguely sleazy or more handsome than usual. He really couldn't tell, but there wasn't any time to wash his hair again, so he took one more concerned look at himself before grabbing his bags and heading out the door.

* * *

There were very few things more awkward than being the only person dressed up among a train car full of kids in their late teens and early twenties wearing jeans and hoodies, Zoro was starting to discover.

At least three kids had looked pointedly at him while giggling with their their friends, and one girl who appeared to just barely be 18 had sat down exceedingly close to him the second she'd gotten on, bumping him hard every time the train jolted even a little. He'd been mildly skeeved out at first, until she finally spoke to him and he realized she had _braces_ , and was probably much younger than he'd previously thought. After that, he moved to sit at the end of a different row, beside a sleeping old man.

He was still reeling as he unlocked the door to Sanji's apartment. The only light came from the bedroom, which he headed for immediately. Inside, there was the faint sound of the shower running, so he went ahead and dropped his bag on the floor before laying down on the bed to wait.

The shower turned off within a couple minutes of his arrival, and Sanji came out shortly after, towel around his waist, hair falling in soft, wet waves around his face, glasses perched on his nose. Zoro grinned.

"You're wrinkling the hell out of your clothes right now," Sanji said. He trailed over to give Zoro a quick kiss, then stepped back to dry himself off.

"Good. They deserve it. Did you know a woman who was at least 50 years old told me that my dick looked good in these pants?" Zoro asked.

Sanji lowered the towel from where he'd been drying his hair, his lips twitching a couple times, and then he let out a loud guffaw. "Well I'm afraid I have to agree with her, it's very nicely framed."

"Shut up. Robin and Kuina made me spend at least two hours trying on every single pair of pants in the store, and a girl who was probably like 14 years old tried to hit on me the way over here."

Sanji was smirking at him. "Was her technique good at least?"

"You're the worst." Zoro said, and he grabbed a pillow from further up the bed to throw it at Sanji. "Hurry up and get dressed, we have reservations."

"Where at?" Sanji asked, curious. He'd finished drying himself off, and tossed the towel at Zoro's face in revenge for the pillow. It landed over his mouth and one of his eyes, effectively muffling him.

"I'm not telling you," Zoro said.

"But do I have to dress up?"

"Do you really think I would have worn all this if there was the option to not dress up?"

"No, I guess not," Sanji admitted. He turned his back to pull out a pair of underwear from the dresser and tugged them on quickly.

Zoro made a grumpy noise and finally threw the towel to the floor, then closed his eyes as Sanji went to the closet.

He returned fifteen minutes later, wearing a midnight blue shirt buttoned nearly to the throat, sleeves rolled up. Over that, he wore a black knit waistcoat, and slim black trousers to finish it off.

Zoro took a moment to admire him, then laughed. "You look like a librarian."

"But a sexy one, right?" Sanji asked, nudging his glasses up.

"Like one who wants to get bent over in the stacks."

Sanji snorted as he sat down on the bed to put on a pair of socks - gray with little white swirls on them - and his dress shoes. Then he stood, paused, and did a double-take.

"What the hell is on your feet," he said, deadpan.

"I don't own fancy shoes."

"So you enlisted help to find clothes to wear, but you somehow neglected shoes?"

Zoro shrugged and forced himself to sit up. "I was done shopping for the day."

Sanji let out a long-suffering sigh and led the way into the hall. "You're lucky your ass looks so good in those pants, or else I'd fucking kick it."

"I'd like to see you try," Zoro said, smiling sharply.

Outside, they hailed down a cab and headed for Hell's Kitchen. Zoro tended to hate taxi rides, often feeling awkward about a complete stranger hearing into his conversations, so he was quiet, looking out the window at the city passing.

The cab finally pulled to a stop down the street from the restaurant, and they hustled onto the curb together. Sanji became more and more excited the closer they came to the building; when Zoro stopped and opened the door for him, he did some kind of adorable fist pump.

"I knew it!" he said, grabbing Zoro's arm as he stepped through.

"Sorry for being predictable," said Zoro, honestly pleased just to see that Sanji was too.

Sanji tightened his fingers around Zoro's forearm and shook his head. "No, I'm glad."

He let Sanji take over once they were seated, unable to really offer much in reply to his chatter about the dishes on the menu and what sounded good. Eventually, the waitress stopped by and he reeled off the name of some white wine and a chicken dish for the appetizer, with no objections from Zoro.

After the waitress had gone on her way, Sanji looked up at him and said, "So. Anniversary dinner, huh?"

"Who said it was an anniversary dinner?" Zoro asked defensively. "Maybe I'm just taking you out for dinner and it's coincidentally on a day that could be taken as an anniversary."

Sanji smiled widely, shaking his head. "I think it's easy enough to guess. Besides, this part of you is cute."

" _What_ ," Zoro intoned.

"Well, obviously you paid attention when I was talking about it on Thanksgiving. And you tried to keep it so secret. _And_ you did it all even though I know you hate silly trivial things like this."

"It's not a big deal," Zoro said, cheeks heating up as he rubbed the back of his neck.

"Thanks," said Sanji, a small, secretive smile on his mouth. "I've never had an anniversary with anybody before. So thanks."

Zoro thought he was about to pass out from how hard his heart was beating inside his chest. He was annoyed that he was reacting this way, even though Sanji hadn't said anything particularly emotionally declarative. It was just becoming harder and harder to deny that how he felt for Sanji had evolved through the years. At first it had been all-encompassing, painfully constant; then it had hibernated, far away from its object so that he almost forgot what it felt like to see Sanji and feel his chest tighten; at last it had been acknowledged, returned (or so he'd thought), and it had exploded into joy and hope for the tiniest sliver of a moment. And finally there was a point, right after leaving Sanji behind for the last time, when he'd felt so consumed by anger and betrayal that it felt like he'd never recover from it. But it had eventually given way to cherishing the memories even when they cut too deep. Zoro had never been the type of person that could give up on anyone, and it was apparent that those feelings he'd clung to were heightening at too quick of a pace. It felt like a rollercoaster of emotion; one moment he was fine and the next he was all too aware of just how much more he felt for Sanji than Sanji probably felt for him.

"Anyway, since I know it's embarrassing for you, maybe you can think of it more like a reward to me for putting up with your ass for a whole month," Sanji was saying as Zoro tuned back in.

"No, I was definitely the one _dealing_ with your ass," Zoro said.

Sanji smirked, obviously pleased at the retort he'd prepared, and he had even opened his mouth to deliver it. But the waitress approached to set down a bottle of wine and a plate of chicken satay, and Zoro could tell from the faint blush on her cheeks that she had heard plenty enough of their conversation.

They paused to order, though it was more like Sanji ordering and Zoro just listening to him fitting his mouth around Thai words, and once the waitress was gone, Sanji poured wine neatly into each glass. He passed one to Zoro, then raised his own and said, "To another month of me putting up with your ass, and you _dealing_ with mine."

Zoro chuckled, and clinked his glass lightly against Sanji's.

Small talk was shared as they waited for the meal to arrive - nothing of any great importance, mostly filling in the blanks of time they'd missed with each other over the past few days, though Zoro drank up Sanji's every word as if he'd be tested on it.

The main course was deep-fried pork ribs and chicken khua khae shared back and forth. Sanji could go on and on about the flavors and the presentation and the freshness of the ingredients as a way of saying it was good, and Zoro listened dutifully, but to him, all he could tell was that it smelled and tasted good. Still, it was fascinating to watch and hear Sanji in his element, in the way that his behavior was more the point of interest than what he was actually talking about.

At some point or another, they had gotten onto the topic of porn parodies. Every time the waitress passed by, she looked more and more pinched around the face, but Zoro and Sanji were laughing almost too hard to notice. Sanji probably would have been a lot more bashful about it, if he had.

"Young Frankenstein could have been a good porno, if it had wanted to be," Zoro said, finishing off a bite of pork.

"Hung Frankenstein?" Sanji suggested. "Who could resist a roll in ze hay with that?"

It startled a laugh out of Zoro, and he almost drooled out the sip of wine he'd taken.

"What about Iron Man? You'd barely even have to change the title," Sanji continued.

"I think he's got an issue, if his dick is made of iron."

"What if it's like, a solo thing?"

"Like what, a male Real Doll made out of iron?" Zoro asked, forking up a piece of chicken.

"Yeah, something like that, I guess," Sanji said.

"I'm pretty sure that'd be differing too much from the plot to qualify as a porn parody."

Sanji snorted. "Uh, I'm pretty sure we're thinking way too much into this. And also, you say that like the plots of porn parodies don't already differ wildly from the source material."

"I wonder how many pornos they make out of tragedies."

"What do you mean?" Sanji asked.

"Do they cut out the parts that are sad, or do you sit down to watch it and it's tons of hardcore porn and then you come back to yourself two hours later, crying because it was actually a story about how love _can_ happen between two people whose only real connection was based on sex, and now they've both died of a terrible disease before they could even realize it."

"Wow, you just turned this into a major downer," Sanji said, expression kind of bewildered. "And I find it ironic that you're so quiet most of the time, but porn parodies turn you into a chatterbox."

Zoro shrugged. "I feel like it's important to know."

"Oh, you wanna go home and look it up on the internet so we can spend our anniversary watching porn?"

"Uh, definitely no," said Zoro through his last mouthful of rice and khua khae. Sanji gave him a stern look that seemed to convey his disapproval at Zoro's lack of manners. "I think I've watched enough weird porn in my life."

"Is that a hobby you picked up in the past couple years?" Sanji asked, sipping at his wine.

"Nah. Porn creeps me out."

"Yeah, I was over it by the time I was old enough to actually have sex."

Zoro scoffed. "No you weren't."

"Shut up, bastard, I was!"

Zoro laughed as the waitress appeared to check up on them again, dread in every line of her posture. Sanji finally noticed how weirded out she was by them, and set to smoothing the ruffled feathers. By the time she walked away with their plates and an order for starfruit sorbet, she was blushing for entirely different reasons, having been thoroughly flattered by Sanji's words.

"Chopper's birthday is tomorrow," Sanji suddenly said.

"Yeah, I heard he was on call the whole day."

"We should take him dinner and cake."

Zoro shrugged. "If you want to. He'd probably be really happy about it."

"I made him cake last year and he practically had a fucking heart attack. I don't know what it is about that kid that causes him to be so surprised when people do things for him."

"He was kind of an outcast when he was younger," Zoro said simply, since the waitress was back again. She placed down a bowl of sorbet along with the requested check, and disappeared once more.

"We're not about to fight over who gets to pay, are we?" Sanji asked, eying the slip of paper as he picked up a spoon.

"No. I will, since I was the one who asked you to dinner."

"Wow, that was surprisingly easy," Sanji said. He dug his spoon into the sorbet and came up with far more than he should probably have been attempting to eat if he wanted to avoid brain freeze, then tucked it into his mouth.

Zoro took his own smaller spoonful, grimacing as he ate it. It was too sweet for his tastes, but he swallowed the first bite anyway, then motioned for Sanji to have the rest.

Sanji looked all too pleased about getting to eat the remainder, and promptly dug in. Meanwhile, Zoro tucked his card into the folder and pushed it to the edge of the table, content to watch Sanji.

"I bet I could make this," Sanji murmured after a few more bites.

"I'm sure you could," Zoro agreed.

Sanji was quiet as he rolled the flavors over his tongue, then he put down his spoon, pulled out his phone, and started typing.

Zoro drained the last of his wine and sat his glass down neatly; apparently having half the bottle hadn't even affected him in any noticeable manner. "You're awful," he said, chuckling.

"What?" Sanji asked, looking confused.

"You come to a restaurant, eat their food, then you say to yourself 'wow, I could make this better' and start typing out a recipe."

"I didn't say I could make it better!" Sanji objected. The waitress stopped by to pick up their check then, and returned shortly thereafter, wishing them a good night, though she directed it mostly at Sanji.

"But you could," Zoro continued once she'd gone for sure.

Sanji looked confused for a moment, unsure what Zoro was talking about, but then realization struck. "Well, I mean, yeah, there's definitely some aspects that could be improved on."

"See, that's awful."

"That's just what we cooks do," Sanji said, rolling his eyes. "Constantly plagiarizing and rebuilding recipes to make them better. Reinventing the wheel, so to speak."

"Do you cooks ever come up with anything new?"

"Oh, once in a while," Sanji said, smiling as he finished typing. "And then we all clamber around trying to take credit for it."

Zoro went quiet again as Sanji finished up the last of the sorbet, then they took a few moments to gather themselves, putting coats and gloves back on, replacing wallets and phones, and headed for the exit.

Outside, Sanji started to hail a cab, but Zoro snatched his hand out of the air and used it to lead him down the street toward 11th and up 44th. It was dark and cold out now, but they walked close to each other, shoulders bumping together every now and then, and it almost seemed a little warmer because of it.

They crossed onto the greenway and that was when Zoro felt a prod against his pocketed hand. He glanced down and saw Sanji's gloved fingers splayed out. Zoro smiled into the turned-up collar of his coat, and carefully laced his fingers into Sanji's.

For close to half an hour they walked, all the way through Chelsea and down into the Meatpacking district. At some point, it had started to snow hard, and drifts would occasionally drop from the shoulders of their coats.

New York wasn't an entirely different place in the snow - it wasn't washed clean, or painted pure white - but it changed the people. They passed few others on their walk, and the figures they did were in an even bigger rush than usual. In the middle of it all, Sanji and Zoro kept their meandering pace, squinting through the flakes flying at their faces, grimacing against the growing wind. When they finally gave in and decided to hail for a cab, their hands were very nearly frozen together so that they both had to reach into the air to flag one down.

Even when they went to get into the warm car, they couldn't let go of each other, something that caused Sanji to laugh endlessly. The cold had made his cheeks radiant, tiny snowflakes were caught in his eyelashes, his mouth was smiling happily, and Zoro was utterly speechless. At the cabby's grumbling complaint, they finally slid in one after the other on the same side.

The way back to Sanji's apartment was quiet, and Zoro was thankful for it. It gave him time to think, time to suss out just what it was that was making him feel so happy, just like this. In the silence, snow outside the window, hands locked together, he discovered that a decade had changed him, but not nearly so much that Sanji's smile, his laugh, had lost their abilities to make Zoro feel powerless to his own heart.

By the time they pulled up outside of the building, it was moving on to blizzard territories. They'd finally managed to let go of each other's hands, and now Sanji was walking slightly behind, kicking up little puffs of snow. Zoro stood impatiently holding the door for him, much to the frustration of some guy getting his mail in the lobby.

Inside, it was so warm it was almost shocking. They took the elevator up and Zoro ran ahead, getting the door unlocked while Sanji was still stomping off his shoes and complaining about the snow ruining them, as if he hadn't been the one playing around in it.

"What's your rush?" Sanji wondered as he got to the door and followed Zoro in, looking faintly amused all the while.

"I need to get out of these fucking clothes."

Sanji's amusement turned to a full-blown smile. "Gonna give me a strip show?"

"Sure, if you want it to take two seconds and consist of every button popping off at once."

"No fun at all."

Zoro grinned and placed a kiss on Sanji's mouth. "It's so heartbreaking that you're only into me for my body."

Sanji shrugged, smile turning devilish. "It must be hard to realize that you're basically in competition with yourself for my affections."

"You mean I didn't already have them?"

"You have a little chunk of them."

"Mm. What do I have to do to get the rest of them?"

Sanji paused in taking off his coat. "Only time can tell," he said, more serious than their previous joking warranted.

They finished undressing in the bedroom without turning the lights on. Sanji huffed a bit when he noticed Zoro had just tossed his clothes on the floor, and took the extra time to fold them carefully before he crawled into bed.

It was only about 9:30, but every emotional bump Zoro had gone through over the course of the evening had left him exhausted. He didn't understand why, because it wasn't as though he'd made some kind of great revelation; it felt like he'd always known that he loved Sanji at this point. It was just one of those facts of life that only smartasses tried to question, like why the sky was blue, or why mud was squishy, or why guys had nipples - it lingered in the back of the mind, but it wasn't as though the answer would make sense or feel satisfying even if you knew the reason.

Zoro turned on his side to face Sanji, determined to fight the tiredness. "Did you talk to your dad about Christmas?"

"Yeah, he'll be here for a little while, then he's going over to Kureha's. What about Koshiro?"

"I didn't talk to him. Kuina did. She said he'd probably stop by." Zoro felt almost bad - he knew that the older they all got, the larger the rift became between his sister and their father. Honestly, so did the rift between he and Zoro. The man had brought him in and raised him well, imbued upon him skill and discipline, but the little day-to-day things often clouded his ability to really tolerate their father, who was well into his fifties by now, and set in his ways. More stubborn than Zoro, even. Koshiro's behaviors that had seemed acceptable to Zoro as a child were now things that he could barely think of without becoming angry, and it had become increasingly obvious in their interactions.

"Well we'll just see him if we see him. There'll be enough food to go around," Sanji said, in such a manner that it was clear he'd dropped the subject.

Zoro nodded and tucked his arms around Sanji's waist, chin propped on his sharp collarbone.

"Thanks for tonight," Sanji whispered after a while.

"Yeah."

"It means a lot to me."

"I'm glad," Zoro said drowsily.

They lapsed into silence again, until Sanji abruptly hopped out of bed.

"Where are you going?" Zoro called after him, sitting up.

"Wait here for a second!"

He came back a minute later with a pint-sized cup of ice cream, a spoon, and a bottle of Crown Royal, all of which he handed to Zoro.

"I appreciate being handed whiskey, but what's the ice cream about?" Zoro asked.

"I feel bad you didn't get to have dessert."

Zoro shrugged, tilting up the cup. "I'm probably not going to want to eat it anyway..."

"And that's where you're wrong. _Beer_ flavored ice cream," Sanji said with a wink as he climbed over Zoro's lap to get to the other side of the bed. He crawled under the sheets and got settled against Zoro's side.

"You had me at beer. And at expensive whiskey."

"Admit it, I've got you wrapped around my finger."

"Yeah, you pretty much do," Zoro admitted as he popped the lid off of the ice cream and dug the spoon in, making a satisfied noise once he brought it to his mouth and tasted it.

"Good?" Sanji asked.

"Yeah."

He ate a few more spoonfuls, then sat the cup down and popped the seal on the bottle of Crown, from which he guzzled down an eighth before passing it to Sanji.

Sanji took it and swallowed a wincing mouthful, paused to make an awful face of disgust, then took another. "I can't believe I'm spending my first ever anniversary sitting in the dark in my bed getting drunk with you."

Zoro laughed and grabbed the bottle back from Sanji's loose hands. "You don't get the suave, fancy anniversary nights until we've been together longer than a month."

"I wasn't complaining. It's just not really the kind of anniversary material that pops into my mind."

"I actually don't think I can say I've just sat around and gotten drunk with anyone I've ever dated," Zoro said after a moment of thinking. He picked up the ice cream again, holding the bottle of Crown between his knees as he loaded up another spoonful.

"Really?"

"Nope. Most of them were casual drinkers, but they always seemed to do it with their friends."

Sanji's head dropped to Zoro's shoulder and he reached over to snag Zoro's spoonful of ice cream since he hadn't eaten it just yet. "You like drinking a lot," he said after swallowing.

Zoro grunted, dropped the spoon back in the cup, then took another couple mouthfuls from the bottle and replaced it between his knees. "At first I mostly did it so I wouldn't feel weird around other people in social settings, then I realized that I'd wake up the next morning and either remember nothing or remember being drunk and saying idiotic things, so I guess I just sort of stopped when I was around anybody. Mostly it became something that would calm me down after a long day at work and that was... _is_ something that I still tend to need some days."

"It's not good for you," Sanji sighed.

"Says the one who's been smoking since he was 13."

"Hey! I didn't actually start to smoke regularly until I was 18."

"Just think of it this way: you smoke more cigarettes in a day than I have glasses of alcohol."

"I smoke less than half a pack a day. Also, it doesn't count if your glass is gigantic. You're still having just as much." The bottle was taken from between his knees, and Sanji tipped it into his mouth. It was well on its way to half-empty now.

"Well why do you smoke?" Zoro asked.

"I don't know, I like it, but I think mostly I'm just used to it."

"That's how me and alcohol are. Except it's the reverse - I'm used to it, but mostly I just like it."

"What if it impedes your ability to do your job?" Sanji asked. He took another couple sips before handing the bottle back, and Zoro gulped some down too just for the hell of it. When he tilted it back up, it had sunk firmly below the halfway point.

"Believe it or not, I don't usually get called in. I mean yeah, there are instances where I absolutely have to be there, but before this past year they were... a lot less," Zoro said. He tended to actively refuse to talk about his job, especially when it came to civilians, so he knew the alcohol was starting to take effect.

"Is something happening?" Sanji inquired. At some point, his voice had started to slur just a little, and Zoro frankly found it adorable.

"Some new group came into town, we're guessing about four years ago. They just started trying to dominate in the past year and the other gangs aren't taking it well, which means they've started to crawl out of the woodwork. It took them a while to get off their feet, but the second they did... Shit just hasn't calmed down since. We can't even keep up with all of it."

"I wonder why I haven't heard anything about it?" Sanji said, denying the bottle when Zoro tried to pass it to him.

He took one last sip, then capped the bottle so he could go back to the ice cream. "Most of it we've tried to keep under wraps... The rest of it's reported in such a way that it doesn't seem connected on the outside."

Sanji hummed, head falling to the side.

"Honestly, it makes having relationships really hard... So I'm glad that we've made it even a month," Zoro continued.

"It's caused you issues?" Sanji asked. His eyes were turned toward the balcony, where snow had begun to form large piles.

"Oh yeah. That was the reason my ex and I broke up."

"Could they not handle you being called off all the time?"

Zoro chuckled darkly. "Nah. He went undercover."

Sanji looked back at Zoro, and his eyes widened slowly. "Well that's definitely not an excuse you hear every day."

Shrugging, Zoro ate the last of the ice cream and dropped the cup on the nightstand by his side. "I wasn't all that upset by it. I wasn't in love with him, and I don't think he was in love with me either. We were always thinking of other people, probably."

"Hmm, who were you thinking of?" Sanji asked.

Zoro didn't think he could trust himself to not give it up, but he somehow managed to force out, "No one specific. Just anyone else."

"Well who do you think he was thinking of?"

"I could never decide. He had this whole group around him, but it was always down between two of them. A girl and a guy. The girl was always really stern and straight-faced that I could see. And the guy was too. Even more so, actually."

"Maybe he had a type," Sanji said, laughing. "I mean, you kind of fit it too."

Zoro tilted his head into Sanji's. "You think so?"

"Whenever I talk to you while you're at work, you seem kind of stiff. You don't really joke around as much."

"Yeah, but he saw me outside of work too."

"Honestly tell me that you would have warmed up to me as quickly if you hadn't known me since you were a kid."

Being completely truthful, Zoro didn't think he could. If he'd just met Sanji... it could have taken him forever to soften up to him, or to even be open to making or accepting a move. "You're right, I guess I wouldn't have."

"So you probably never actually showed him the side that you show me. Don't we always see what we want to in others, rather than what they feel like they're showing?"

Zoro guessed he agreed, so he made a sound in the affirmative. "Anyway, he was a good guy. I was a little sad to see him go."

"Getting all maudlin about your exes on our anniversary? Kinda shitty of you, bastard," Sanji said. He was laughing, though.

"What about you, any hookups you'd like to confess that could have gone somewhere?"

Sanji breathed in, taking a moment to think. "Yeah, actually. There was this guy when I was a teenager."

Zoro clammed up almost instantly, fearing the worst.

"We never got along, the whole time I knew him. Just looking at him made me want to kick his ass. Then he moved to New York with his dad and his sister and I realized that everything felt wrong without him. We'd talk sometimes, but it was like he was a completely different person - always on edge, always kind of distant. When I found out the old man and I were moving back to France, I freaked out and called him, and he got on a train to come to me. And we spent a couple weeks together, where I was fucked up a lot of the time because honestly, without him around, I'd gone down some dark roads... I treated the whole thing like it was any other week, as if there wasn't a chance that I'd never see him again. And we fooled around some, because I was drunk and scared to lose him. Actually, he was my first kiss." Sanji stopped, smiled, and the blooming of hope in Zoro's chest was almost painful. "And because I was stupid and thought it was wrong, I ran away. I stayed with a mutual friend until my dad told me he'd gone home, and I went to France, and I never forgot about him. The one who got away. I hear he's a pretty great guy these days."

Zoro's throat felt dry and scratchy, like his body wanted to force him into crying. Not out of sadness, but out of gratefulness that he hadn't been alone in feeling the way he had all those years ago after all. He hadn't made a mistake, he hadn't ruined it like he'd always feared he had. "He never forgot about you either, but I hear it turned out alright."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. I hear there was a second chance, that he's more happy than he's ever been, and that if he had to do it all over again, he'd let it play out exactly like it did. He likes you, in spite of everything."

Sanji chuckled. "I like him too."

Zoro smiled, gripping Sanji's hand tightly. He couldn't resist the urge to kiss each of his knuckles. "He missed you. You were always the ideal for him."

"He's got pretty weird standards."

"He's got good taste. He picked you, after all."

Sanji turned a bright smile on him. "You actually liked me, huh?"

Zoro couldn't even begin to figure out how to put it in words. "I don't know how to tell you what I felt for you. I didn't even think you remembered it. You hadn't mentioned it."

"I know I was drunk a lot of the time, but it didn't fuck with my memory. You don't just forget about almost losing your virginity to a guy you thought you hated."

"Fair enough," Zoro conceded.

"Am I a disappointment now? When you think about who I used to be?" Sanji wondered.

"No. You're different, but it's not bad, because I'm different too. The people we are now fit together better than we did then."

"I wasn't a happy person back then," Sanji admitted. "I don't think we would have stayed together long if I was still that person. I guess I'm not sorry for making you wait for me this long."

"I didn't mind waiting," Zoro said. "It was the not knowing that hurt."

"I'm sorry," Sanji said, biting his lip.

"Don't apologize for that. Don't ever. Like I said, I'd let it play out exactly like it did."

For a while, they said nothing. But Zoro was suddenly wide awake - any tiredness he'd been feeling earlier had disappeared with the consumption of alcohol and the jumpstarting of Sanji's confession. His mind was racing, and the recollection of those memories had brought back other ones from even earlier - more one-sided, but they'd been a turning point anyway, despite how he'd held them in shame for so many years, reluctant to even think of them.

Sighing, he shifted his boxer briefs down and wrapped a hand around himself. He was past the point of being able to tell if he was quiet about it, too drunk to really gauge anything with any kind of accuracy. And he let himself think about it, for the first time in a long time...

_Their first sleepover since they were ten._ Fucking snowed in, _Zoro thought._ Awesome. _He'd wanted to go home, he'd wanted time_ away _from Sanji so that he could fucking_ think _for a change, so that he could feel like he wasn't constantly crawling out of his body with want._

_It was very teenaged of him. He figured he deserved a pass, because most of the time, he didn't think twice about people. Hot waitress that Sanji wouldn't shut up about when they were at the ice cream place? Whatever. Sweet-faced guy with pouty lips and brown puppy-dog eyes? Couldn't care less. Short chubby androgynous person with impeccable fashion sense? Eh._

_Sanji. Just Sanji. He couldn't get him off his goddamn mind. It was eating him up inside. The night before, he'd woken up around three in the morning, boxers uncomfortably wet and cooling quickly as the memory of fucking Sanji in his dreams faded from the forefront of his mind. He didn't know what the hell he'd do if there was a repeat incident in Sanji's room tonight; just thinking about it was enough to make him feel mortified._

_Because of course he was sleeping in Sanji's room, no matter how much he protested and said he'd take the couch. Zeff had forced Sanji to let Zoro sleep on the bed for a change, and the moon was currently highlighting exactly how grumpy Sanji was about having to sleep on the cold floor._

" _Hey," Zoro said quietly. He was down to a pair of Sanji's sweatpants that were way tighter on him than they had any right being. "You can sleep up here too if you want."  
_  
" _Ugh, that's so gay," Sanji said, face sour._

_Zoro rolled his eyes. "Because sleeping in the bed with another dude definitely turns you gay, right. Last time I checked, the only thing that made you gay was, oh... deciding that you're gay?"_

" _Shut the fuck up, asshole."_

" _Worried about your masculinity?"_

" _Bastard, I'm the most masculine guy on the face of the planet!" Sanji said, voice rising enough that Zeff could probably hear them bickering from his room._

" _Not masculine enough to sleep in the bed with me."_

" _Fucking fine, if it makes you so happy," Sanji ground out, and stomped over, flinging the comforter back and dropping down beside Zoro. Their shoulders touched, and Sanji kicked Zoro's foot hard. "Move the fuck over."_

_Zoro scooted an inch or so toward the wall, turned on his side, then tried to settle in. Sanji's skin radiated heat close by, and it was too distracting._

_He'd actually managed to start drifting off when he heard Sanji make a small sound, and he would have asked what was the matter until Sanji grunted and his elbow began to bump rhythmically into Zoro's back._

_Ah, the distinct formula for masturbation. Zoro didn't dare to change his breathing pattern, as much as he wanted to hold it and hear every little noise Sanji had to offer._

_And his body was starting to react too, because of it. Sometimes Sanji's ass would nudge against Zoro's back, and he'd have to force himself not to move, not to make any sound, not to just reach down and jerk himself off right then._

_He wanted to see, though. He wanted to know if Sanji's face would flush like he thought it would, he wanted to know if Sanji was teasing himself, he wanted to know if his mouth dropped open when he found just the right spot, he wanted to see his face when he came. He wanted to touch, he wanted to put his mouth on Sanji._

_But he couldn't, and that's what kept him waiting until Sanji came with a soft, startled gasp, wiped himself off with a tissue, then settled back into bed with a huff. And he kept waiting, what felt like hours, for Sanji's breath to even out. When he felt it was safe, he pushed down his borrowed sweatpants just enough to get his cock out._

_It didn't take him long to come, and he didn't want it to. This wasn't one of those sessions that was meant to actually feel good - it was solely to bring relief. He tried to think of nothing, but his brain refused to do anything but replay those noises Sanji made, and he had to bite his other palm hard to keep from echoing them. He shot into his hand, then awkwardly glanced around, trying to find something to clean himself up with._

_In the end, he crawled one-handed out of bed and went to the bathroom, where he probably should have done this in the first place. At least he would have been locked away in secret, away from the guilt, where he could pretend he was thinking about anyone else. He washed up and splashed his face with some cool water, and took a moment to just breathe._

_God, he was so fucked._

Zoro jumped when fingers trailed down his side, went under the sheet, and wrapped around his hand, moving with Zoro's each stroke.

"Up to something without me?" Sanji asked. His voice was slow from being nearly asleep.

"I didn't want to keep you awake," Zoro replied. He moved his hand in long, slow pulls, feeling somewhat foolish at being caught out.

"I don't mind," Sanji said. His fingers were almost entirely uncoordinated, doing more harm than good. He laughed at himself, pressing his face into Zoro's shoulder. "I'm really drunk."

"Yeah, I can tell," Zoro whispered.

Sanji dropped his hand to Zoro's thigh instead, making himself comfortable against his side. "Can I see?" he asked.

Zoro nodded, and Sanji clumsily pushed down the sheets.

He wasn't sure why it felt so embarrassing to be seen like this. It wasn't like they weren't fairly frequently naked in front of each other. Still, there was something about it that caused him to flush as he worked himself over and Sanji watched. Maybe it was the fact that what got him hot and bothered was a memory from so many years ago that it was practically about a different person.

Sanji pressed his mouth to Zoro's chest in a kiss, then spoke against his skin. "I can hear you freaking out from here. A little bit of exhibition never hurt anyone."

Zoro laughed softly. The spell was broken with Sanji's approval, and he stroked himself more firmly now, becoming more and more confident with each pass. It was easy to lose himself in it, the idea that Sanji's gaze was on him even as uninvolved as he was, and by the time he came, he was panting and Sanji was gripping his thigh hard. The tiny amount of pain as Sanji's nails pressed into his skin when his hips bucked up into his fist was enough to make him moan.

He hadn't even come down from his high yet when Sanji passed him a tissue. "That was lovely," he whispered.

Hands shaking just a little, Zoro wiped his stomach off and tossed the tissue across Sanji and into the trash, landing it perfectly.

Sanji leaned up and slanted his mouth against Zoro's. They kissed for a few moments, drunk and easily distracted in each other, before Sanji rolled back and settled into the pillow again.

"I'm going to feel awful tomorrow," Sanji said, muffled.

"We can feel awful together."

A quiet huff of laughter, and Sanji's hand came back to grip Zoro's. "I'll look forward to it."


	6. Christmas in the Room

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to be pushing updates back to every other Friday. I haven't lost my steam on this fic by any means, but life's getting a little bit busy and I don't wanna half-ass any part of this. I'm hoping this is only a temporary thing, and that I'll be able to get back to posting weekly in a month or two.
> 
> Also, a couple warnings for this chapter, including references to PTSD and non-graphic flashbacks to a near-death incident.

Zoro felt as though he was being stabbed in the skull repeatedly.

He'd first awoken around six in the morning and had glanced at the clock, but even those tiny shining green lights were too damn much for him, and he'd winced and turned his face away. Luckily, Sanji was still asleep beside him, his chest rising and falling evenly. No one else should have had to share in this kind of misery so early in the morning.

He'd smacked his face into the darkness of his pillow after confirming that Sanji wasn't dead of alcohol poisoning, and managed to fall back asleep despite the pain. When he woke again, Sanji was nowhere to be seen.

He raised his head gingerly. There was a glass of water and a couple tablets of aspirin on the nightstand, which he took on autopilot. Then he laid his head back on the pillow and took a few moments to regret his decisions. He knew better than to drink like he was still 21, but apparently last night had been such a good occasion that he couldn't resist. At the very least, he hadn't blacked out.

After ten minutes of laying there massaging his temples and berating himself, he finally sat up and swung his legs over the edge of the bed, put his feet on the floor, and shambled out of the bedroom toward the kitchen.

Sanji was inside, moving around quietly with a cup of coffee in one hand and a lit cigarette in the other. He looked nowhere near as haggard as Zoro probably did. In fact, he didn't seem like he'd done any drinking at all the previous night, cheerful as his disposition currently was. And if his lack of glasses were a signifier, he'd even bothered to put in his contacts, something he very rarely did until the last possible second even on a normal day.

"Good morning, grumpy," Sanji said brightly.

"Hey," Zoro croaked. "Why the hell are you so happy?"

"I woke up around three and made myself throw up," said Sanji as he pushed a cup of tea across the counter to Zoro.

Zoro grabbed it up immediately, and grunted in combined acknowledgment and thanks. He leaned against the sink, trying to ignore the pounding in his head, and took a sip of his tea, which was the perfect temperature now, so he didn't have to add burning his tongue to the list of ways this day had already gone wrong. The sound of sizzling assaulted his ears, and he squinted toward the stove, where a pan containing hash browns sat, popping away. There were pancakes and bacon too. Zoro's stomach rumbled loudly, but the thought of eating made him kind of nauseous at the same time. He grimaced. It was entirely possible he was still a little drunk.

"What a way to start Christmas Eve, eh?" Sanji asked, holding his cigarette in the corner of his mouth as he flipped the pancakes.

"I am really dumb," replied Zoro.

"Yup."

He glared at Sanji's back, to no effect. "Did I say you could agree with me?"

"Shouldn't have said it if you didn't want me to agree with you."

Zoro grumbled, staying exactly where he was while Sanji put the finishing touches on breakfast. His eyes could finally open enough to look out the window above the sink, where the sky was dark gray and piles of snow sat on everything. Still more was coming down, though not as hard as it had last night. Birds were fluttering around, kicking up drifts as they tried to find some shelter, and the people who were out in it far below were hunched against the wind, looking like knitted dolls from this far up.

The burners clicked as they turned off, and Zoro turned to look back at Sanji, who was plating everything up and trying to make as little noise as possible. Zoro was thankful for it.

They decided on eating in the living room, which was a fair amount dimmer than any other room in the apartment. Zoro carried the plates out while Sanji stayed behind in the kitchen getting drink refills, and he had begun to get comfortable on the couch with his plate in hand when Sanji came out looking far too amused for his own good. He passed off a Bloody Mary to Zoro on the way to sit down, and missed the series of emotions Zoro's face went through - realization, temptation, and finally horror. For once in his life, he wasn't entirely sure that more alcohol was what he needed at the moment, but he alternated drinking it and a large glass of water anyway.

Neither of them bothered to turn the TV on, and Sanji seemed to realize that Zoro didn't have the capacity to bother with human speech, so they ate mostly in silence. By the time they were done, Zoro felt a tiny bit better. He stood, collecting his dishes, but Sanji was just as quick to jump up and grab them out of his hands.

"No. You lay down," he scolded.

Zoro blinked. "It's fine, I can help."

"You'll probably break one of my plates, I don't want to have to deal with that. Just lay down."

Zoro almost wanted to fight it but he didn't think he could deal with Sanji raising his voice, so he laid on the couch for a while, feeling generally miserable. The light sensitivity had started to abate, but he still felt vaguely nauseous and had a migraine the size of the whole state.

For a couple hours he camped out on the couch, in the mid-state between being asleep and awake. Occasionally, he'd hear Sanji walk by on the periphery of his consciousness, going about his chores without disturbing Zoro.

He must have fallen asleep at some point, because when he opened his eyes, Sanji was sitting at the far end of the couch reading. Zoro stretched his arms, popping his back in the process, and sat up. The hangover seemed to have almost completely receded, but he reached over to drain the last of his water anyway.

"Rejoining the land of the living?" Sanji asked, voice hushed just in case.

"Yeah, I guess so."

"There's three-cheese tortellini with spinach and garlic chicken in the fridge, if you want it."

Zoro nodded and pulled himself up from the sofa, much less unsteady on his feet than he was earlier, and made his way into the kitchen to reheat the pasta.

He ate it on the couch, Sanji humming quietly to himself as he read. And as Zoro ate, he became aware of a low-grade feeling of unease in himself. No matter how he poked and prodded through his own thoughts, he couldn't figure out what it was, until he idly recalled the previous night. Then it hit him.

They had talked about the two weeks he'd spent in Maryland before Sanji left eleven years ago, the two weeks that he'd thought Sanji hadn't remembered. In all honestly, he was surprised even _he_ remembered them, but for a different purpose. Where Sanji had been under the influence for most of that time, Zoro had been almost entirely sober.

There were many reasons he'd effectively erased those two weeks, not all of them related to what he and Sanji had gotten up to together. For him, it was a defense mechanism. His brain didn't want to think of Kuina's accident, so it didn't want to think of anything that had happened around that same time. Living through it once was hard enough, but his brain was also cruel, so it sometimes forced him to suffer through the image of her in a pristine white hospital bed, eyes shut, completely lifeless.

Knowing the reason for his unease was almost a relief, even as that month became front and center in his mind, and he could feel his body reacting. The chemical scent of the hospital filled his nostrils though he knew it was manufactured in his mind and not what this room actually smelled like, and he swore he could almost feel starchy sheets under his fingertips rather than his flannel sleep pants.

At this point in his life, he didn't have flashbacks to that moment too often anymore. In fact, it had been a good eight months since the last time he'd even _thought_ about the accident. Being around Kuina constantly, seeing that she still still safe and whole, tended to be enough to set his mind at peace. Actually, the person who was most likely to cause a relapse at any given time was their father, and maybe that played a part in how avoidant Zoro was of him.

He had forgotten how suddenly it could come on. And he forgot how it could effectively jumble up the rest of his day without even trying. How it could make him forget anything that was happening in the here and now for the sake of drowning in the past.

He put his empty bowl on the coffee table, stood, and headed for the bathroom, where he splashed his face with water several times and forcefully stared himself down in the mirror, examining each detail mindlessly until the memory faded. Then, despite his shaking hands and his unstable legs, he walked calmly back to the living room, where Sanji was still sitting on the couch reading.

"What's up?" he asked when Zoro sat back down.

"Nothing," said Zoro. He looked down at the book Sanji was holding, and decided to evade his brain's continual betrayal by fucking around with Sanji. "I remember when you used to rag on me for reading all the time."

Sanji laughed. "I tend to try and forget about all the dumb shit I did as a kid. Turns out I was an idiot about a lot of things."

"What the hell are you doing with me then? I know basically _all_ of the dumb shit you did as a kid," said Zoro.

A thoughtful look overtook Sanji's face. "Yeah, what the hell _am_ I doing with you? No redeeming qualities whatsoever." His lips twitched, bringing themselves into a smirk.

"None whatsoever?" Zoro questioned.

"Nope. You're like a stray dog that I feel sorry for. I keep you around because I couldn't let you go in good conscience. And you have those big brown puppy dog eyes."

"That sounds nothing like me," Zoro protested.

Sanji's smirk melted down into a smile. He marked his place in the book, and sat it down on the coffee table. "So I was thinking we could go up to Whole Foods and get stuff to make Chopper's birthday dinner with."

Zoro shifted and rubbed his palms on his pants. They just felt like warm, worn fabric. Good. "Yeah, that's fine I guess. Do I have time to take a shower?"

"Sure. I need to write down my list anyway."

"Alright."

They went their separate ways, Sanji into the kitchen to take stock on what he already had, and Zoro to the bedroom to get ready.

Fifteen minutes later, he got out of the shower and dug around in his bag for clothes. He got dressed, and wandered into the living room where Sanji was back at his book.

"Ready?"

"Yeah, let me just finish this page..."

Zoro stood in silence as Sanji's eyes continued flicking back and forth. Then he sighed and went to go get Sanji's coat for him.

By the time he returned, Sanji had slipped into his shoes and was now tapping his foot impatiently, smirk on his face. "Hurry it up."

"You're the one that couldn't tear yourself away from a book that _wasn't_ about cooking," Zoro replied.

Sanji stuck his tongue out, very maturely, and held his arms out at his sides.

"What?" Zoro asked.

"Put my coat on for me."

"You're not a child, do it yourself." Zoro threw the coat at him, landing it perfectly on top of Sanji's head.

"You messed up my hair, shitty bastard!" Sanji yelled.

Zoro cackled and headed for the door.

* * *

Zoro's right leg was falling asleep. For close to five minutes now, Sanji had been debating between two packages of chocolate, and he showed no signs of being done any time soon.

He was trying not to complain, because he could have just said that he didn't want to come in the first place. But it didn't stop him from feeling kind of annoyed with Sanji every time someone obviously waited for them to move out of the way. Near the beginning of their grocery store adventure, he'd offered to take the list and go find the rest of the items, but Sanji had turned him down, saying it was important to be discerning about ingredients.

At the very least, they were reaching the end of the list. There was fresh shrimp in the basket, bean sprouts, jasmine rice, heavy cream, tofu, fresh ginger and garlic, snow peas, cashews, strawberries, and strangely, both a bag of cotton candy and artificial cotton candy flavoring.

Zoro had to admit, he was feeling a little worried as he wondered what in the hell Sanji could possibly be making with all of this. Of course he had the utmost faith that whatever it was would be delicious, but it was still a baffling mixture.

Another few moments, and Sanji finally deposited the bar of 70% dark chocolate in the basket. "Alright, let's get out of here," he said, and Zoro gladly led the way toward the checkout line.

Afterward, they loaded the bags into a taxi and headed back for the apartment. Sanji was busy typing away on his phone the whole time, so Zoro took the chance to check his email and messages, both of which were thankfully pretty empty for this time of year.

By the time they pulled up, it was starting to snow harder. The sun hadn't shown itself all day, and when Zoro checked the temperature on his phone, it was getting down below 10 degrees.

They hustled the bags upstairs in a single trip, and Zoro unloaded them while Sanji started to peel and devein the shrimp. When he'd finished cleaning them, Sanji brought out a pan and set it on the burner at low heat. He poured in some heavy cream and broke the chocolate into pieces, sprinkling them in on top.

"What are you going to make?" Zoro asked, curiosity finally getting the better of him.

"Spicy chocolate cashew sauce with shrimp and tofu," Sanji said, adding in salt and pepper, and a few spices from the cabinet above his head. "Do you want to help?"

"Is it something I can fuck up?" asked Zoro. He figured he could make himself useful, but he certainly didn't have any kind of faith in his abilities with regards to cooking.

"Nah. Just keep stirring it until the chocolate melts, but make sure to keep a close eye on it so it doesn't curdle or scorch. So long as you keep the heat on low, you should be fine."

Zoro nodded and began to stir dubiously, and free of having to keep his eye on that, Sanji set to taking care of the other ingredients. Occasionally he would come over and drop more things into the pan; first grated garlic and ginger, then tiny chopped bits of chili, then slices of tofu, and finally, snow peas and bean sprouts.

He was starting to realize that one of his favorite things to do was watch Sanji while he cooked. A soft, contented look would come over his face, and he'd unknowingly smile in triumph whenever he did something particularly complex. He talked to himself, too, as he read over recipes, or when he was trying to keep focused on what he was doing. And it always looked like he was genuinely gaining some kind of satisfaction from cooking.

It was incredibly calming for Zoro, especially today.

"You can stop now," Sanji said. He tried a spoonful and nodded before placing a lid on the pan and stepping back. "This just simmers on low heat for half an hour or so."

"What now?" Zoro asked.

"Cotton candy cake."

Zoro shuddered and stuck his tongue out. "Gross."

"Nobody asked you to eat it, bastard!" Sanji said as he dragged out his mixer and a couple of cake pans.

"Good, because I'm not into consuming diabetes in solid form."

Sanji scowled. "This is for Chopper. He gets to eat what _he_ wants because it's _his_ birthday."

With a single step, Zoro drew up behind Sanji and placed his head in the juncture between his shoulder and his neck. Sanji shivered as he breathed there. "What's this?" he asked, picking a steel hook out of the mixing bowl.

"A dough hook," Sanji said, snatching it back.

"What's this?" asked Zoro again, picking out a box that Sanji had tossed in on top of the cake pans.

"Tips," said Sanji shortly, clearly becoming annoyed with Zoro. He shrugged his shoulders aggressively until Zoro picked his head up and moved to stand by his side instead.

"From your stripping job?"

The annoyed look vanished from his face to be replaced with a confused one, before realization overtook it. "No! Icing tips." He grabbed the box from Zoro and placed it on the counter, far away from Zoro's grasp.

"What's this?" Zoro asked once more, even though he knew exactly what the bag of cotton candy was.

Sanji glanced over and didn't even bother to answer him, just pulled it from Zoro's fingers and whacked him across the knuckles with the spatula he held in his other hand. "Get out of my kitchen! Stop bothering me!"

Zoro laughed, and tired of riling Sanji up, he vacated the kitchen for the living room. He spent the next hour and a half channel surfing and texting Luffy about his training, until Sanji finally came out of the kitchen.

"Get ready to go," he said. His arms were full with tupperware containers and a cake plate.

Zoro grumbled and sat up to put his shoes on as Sanji put everything in one of the leftover paper bags from the grocery store, then they got into their coats and gloves before heading down into the snow to hail for a taxi. It was getting dark, and the temperature was dropping even lower. Zoro shivered a bit, and wondered if Sanji was going to be able to hold out, considering he was a fair amount smaller despite being of a height with Zoro.

The way to the hospital was entirely too familiar for him, between Kuina's accident and work. Several years ago, almost every day for more than a month, he had taken this route. And he could hardly count the number of times he'd had to head over to get testimonies throughout the years, but it wasn't until recently that he'd had to make frequent detours to it. He was seeing more and more of the drab yellow hallways, more people in hospital gowns, more sad families crowding around, waiting to see if their loved ones would live through the night or if they should begin saying their goodbyes.

It was starting to take its toll frankly. He'd been idealistic when he had first started studying criminal justice, thought he could do it all. But he couldn't. He was a speck along with all the other specks, and he didn't hold the power any more than they did, but he could _try_. He was trying so hard, even if one man wasn't an army.

"We're here," Sanji said, snapping Zoro away from his thoughts. He got out behind Sanji, and they walked together into that dreadful place.

The lobby was much emptier than usual, less staff on the desks and less patients milling about. Those that were able had probably gone home to be with their families for the holidays, and the ones that remained didn't look too pleased about having to be here.

Sanji approached the old woman at the front desk, a strained smile on his face. It was clear he knew her, and didn't really want to be speaking to her. "Is Chopper around?" he asked.

"Oh yes, he's around. He seemed upset when I saw him earlier. I think he wanted to be able to spend his birthday with his grandma," the old woman said. She sighed sadly. "A damn shame. Having to work around so many people suffering on your birthday. What kind of justice is that?"

Zoro was starting to understand why Sanji looked so dismayed at having to talk to her. She had the air of a gossip about her, and was incredibly chatty to boot.

"Yes, it's-" Sanji started, except she plowed right on over him.

"And on Christmas Eve too! If only that Trafalgar hadn't changed his mind about taking the day off at the last minute. Probably going to hang around with that ruffian friend of his. What a terrible influence, you'd never think to look at the two of them that they even move in the same circles... That Trafalgar keeps his secrets! Especially those tattoos of his. I told him, you're going to regret that when you're older, and none of your patients will think you're very professional if they see them-"

"Um-" Sanji tried again.

"No one thinks ill of Dr. Chopper, what a respectful young man... That poor dear, it's so sad. So sad... He doesn't even have anyone to go home to. I wonder if he'd like my granddaughter, she's such a sweet thing. Could do him some good!"

Sanji attempted to interrupt yet again, but she just kept talking.

"Oi. Page Chopper for us, will you?" Zoro said, raising his chin and narrowing his eyes. He knew for a fact that he was intimidating, and he worked it for all it was worth.

The woman paled and picked up the phone by her side, murmuring to herself as she dialed.

They made for the seating area, which was decorated in a hideous mixture of turquoise and light wood that probably hadn't been changed since the 90's, and sat down.

"I hope he's not overworking himself," Sanji sighed, adjusting the bag on his lap.

"He'll be fine. He's taking tomorrow and the next two days off."

"Yeah. I'm just sort of angry because Law took off at the last second. Chopper had been looking forward to having today off."

As if summoned by their talking about him, Chopper came out of closest hallway, looking stressed and rushed. "Sanji! Zoro! What are you doing here?" he asked, brightening as he spotted them.

"We brought you dinner," Sanji said. "Moss-for-brains even helped out with it a little."

Chopper's face turned bashfully happy as Sanji handed the bag off to him. "I don't appreciate it at all, you assholes!" he said, almost wiggling in joy.

Zoro smiled fondly. "Happy birthday, Chopper."

"Th-thank you," Chopper stuttered, cheeks flushing red.

"Happy birthday," said Sanji.

"THANK YOU."

"Any plans?" asked Sanji.

"No. Grandma was going to take me out to dinner but that got canceled. I bought myself a couple books about medical history though, so I think I'll read those when I get home!"

"Uh. Don't you want to do something that isn't reading?" said Sanji.

"Why would I want to do anything else?" Chopper asked, genuinely confused.

"No reason. It's your birthday after all, you get to do what you want to do." Zoro said, entirely aware that he was maybe getting back at Sanji for his earlier lecture about the cake.

They lingered around a few minutes longer, making small talk and discussing Christmas plans before Chopper had to get back to work, then they went on their own way.

* * *

Back at the apartment, Sanji took the remaining rice and shrimp from the warming drawer and dished it up along with a couple glasses of white wine. They ate on the sofa, flicking the TV on halfway through an episode of Monty Python.

"You know, I've never watched any of this before," Sanji confessed after some time.

"Heretic," Zoro replied.

"What's heretical is that it's Christmas Eve and we're watching Monty Python rather than shitty Christmas movies."

"Who in the world actually enjoys anything Christmas-related? Everyone dreads that shit."

"I'm sure some people out there like it..." Sanji said, though he seemed unsure. He leaned over and thumbed a bit of sauce away from Zoro's cheek before going back to his own plate. "And please stop eating like you're three years old."

"If those people even exist, they're fucked up," Zoro said, eating even more sloppily just to annoy Sanji.

"Maybe they just like things that you don't."

"Their loss."

Sanji scoffed. "I'm going to make sure to turn the alarm to a station that plays Christmas music before bed so tomorrow you'll wake up to it."

"Come the fuck on, isn't it bad enough that I woke up with a hangover this morning?"

"Nope."

"You're the worst."

"You don't think that," Sanji laughed, putting his empty plate down on the table.

Zoro did the same, but not before licking up some of the sauce and causing Sanji to yell wordlessly at him. "Yeah, I do."

"No you don't." Sanji scootched across the couch and pushed Zoro down into the arm of it, smiling wickedly. "You _like_ me."

"I take it back," Zoro said, putting his hands on Sanji's hips, thumbs stroking under his shirt.

"You can't take that back," Sanji whispered as he leaned down into Zoro's space.

"I just did."

"But I'd be upset."

Zoro's hands slipped fully under Sanji's shirt, tracing up and down his sides slowly. He could feel goosebumps rising under his fingertips, and Sanji shivered.

Gradually, he leaned up and touched his lips to Sanji's. They were cool and somewhat dry from the temperature, and Zoro bit at them gently until Sanji made a soft noise of protest and pulled back.

"What's up with you tonight?" he asked.

"I was just thinking about something that happened a long time ago. It's stupid," Zoro said, anchoring his hands firmly around Sanji's back.

Sanji moved his head to the side, soft hair falling on Zoro's cheek. "Why's it stupid?"

"It just is. But it's not really my story to tell."

Sanji made a soft noise of assent, then tucked his head down against Zoro's neck.

* * *

At some point, they'd fallen asleep just like that. Zoro awoke to the TV on infomercials, and he nudged Sanji until his eyes fluttered open.

"'S wrong?" he asked sleepily.

"Let's go get in bed," Zoro replied.

They stood on unsteady legs, having to help each other up, and made their way to the bedroom after turning the TV and the remaining lights out.

In bed, they fitted their bodies close, arms draped over waists and legs tucked together. Tomorrow morning, they would wish they'd have bothered to do more than just strip out of their jeans and t-shirts before falling asleep, but it was a night only, and Zoro was happy to be enfolded in Sanji's arms.

* * *

Sanji had always had a habit of waking before everyone else on Christmas. He was excitable where Kuina and Zoro were just too lazy to crawl out of bed before nine in the morning, and also the one most likely to try and peek into presents before anyone else awoke.

However, this morning he slept in. Zoro crawled out of the clutches of sleep and opened his eyes to find that neither one of them had moved from the other in the night.

He stroked a hand down Sanji's back repeatedly, fingers sliding over soft skin warmed by the sheets. Sanji barely even stirred, and Zoro took the time to trace out each line of ink on his waist while he had the chance.

Eventually, he drew away and pushed the sheets down just enough to get out of bed, then crept into the living room. The sky was still gray, and snow continued to drift down. He laid a hand against the balcony door, and felt the cold creep into his flesh. The world down below seemed to still be asleep, and he had a brief moment of feeling incredibly, comfortingly alone.

Glancing around himself, his eyes alighted on the plates from last night's dinner. He picked them up, took them into the kitchen, and proceeded to scrub them clean before dropping them into the dishwasher.

Next, he slipped into the bathroom to take a shower and brush his teeth, and by the time he came out, Sanji was stretched out like a starfish on the sheets, eyes blinking slowly.

"Merry Christmas," Zoro said, crawling across the bed to him. He dropped a kiss on Sanji's brow, and paused when Sanji's hand slid up his chest, curling around his jaw.

He smiled up at Zoro, still asleep for the most part. "Merry Christmas," he replied.

They lay together in silence for a couple minutes before Sanji finally sat up. "Coffee," he moaned.

"I'll go get the coffee. You clean up."

Sanji nodded and slid off the bed, staggering in the direction of the bathroom, so Zoro stood and pulled on a pair of sleep pants. In the kitchen, he poured a cup of coffee for Sanji from the fancy timed coffee machine, then heated up a pan of water for his own tea.

A little while later, Sanji walked into the kitchen wearing Zoro's ratty old Jack Daniels hoodie and a pair of track pants, and gratefully accepted the mug Zoro handed to him.

"You're turning into your dad," said Zoro.

Sanji's eyes narrowed over the lip of the mug. "Say that again, shitty bastard."

Zoro chuckled. "But you are. He never let us open presents until he'd had a cup of coffee. It used to piss you off so bad."

Sanji shrugged. "I don't mind if you open presents before I have my coffee."

"Yeah, sure. I bet you'd manage to find something to get all pissy about."

"Go on, get in there then. Let's open presents before breakfast."

They seated themselves on the couch after each grabbing their singular gifts. Sanji hadn't put up much in the way of decorations - you could really only tell it was Christmas because of the presents sitting under a large-fronded potted plant with garland and a strand of lights wrapped around it.

They handed their gifts to each other, and Zoro watched as Sanji tried to figure out what was in the bag.

"Stop peeking," Zoro warned.

"Fine, open yours then."

He looked down at the present Sanji had handed him. Somehow it wasn't particularly surprising to him that it was well-wrapped. It was long and thin, and when Zoro knocked on it, it had a hollow plastic sound to it. He started to tear the paper off.

It was... well, it looked like a sword case, the exact same one as Shusui and Sandai Kitetsu were kept in if he was traveling with them, but he couldn't think of any reason for Sanji to buy him another of what he already had.

"Open it," Sanji said, nudging him with his elbow.

Zoro did so, snapping it open and pushing back the cloth, and then he drew his hand away sharply.

There was no fucking _way_ Sanji had just bought him a katana, especially not one as well-crafted as the one laying in the case.

"So," Sanji started, which was good, because Zoro was basically speechless. "There's a story, and a question. Robin's been consulting with some antique weapons dealer, and she texted me a picture of this. Then I texted it to Kuina and she said she recognized it from somewhere and knew it was authentic, so I should definitely check into it. Anyway, that's why I left that day last week, because Robin got me in to talk with this old guy. I guess he could tell that I don't do any kind of sword... things, because he was really reluctant to sell it, no matter how much I offered him. He said it wasn't a toy for people to mess around with. Then I told him that I wasn't looking to buy it for myself, that it was going to be a gift for someone else. He asked who, and I told him your name, and suddenly he was talking about how _honored_ he would be for you to own it." Here Zoro chuckled, knowing immediately who Sanji was talking about. "And the question is, why in the hell would he be honored?"

Zoro let out a breath, stroking over the saya. It had obviously been polished, untouched by any fingerprints or dust at all. "About 9 years ago, Kuina and I walked into a place that was rumored to sell authentic katana. I looked through their stuff but it was pretty much all shit. Then I found one... she and I both recognized it. It put off this aura, I can't explain it. It was rumored to be cursed, but I don't believe in that kind of shit."

Sanji nodded, rapt.

Zoro took a gulp of his tea, then continued. "It was cheap, but the guy refused to sell it to me. Said he wouldn't be held responsible for my death at its edge. And it was stupid, but I made him a bet that if I could prove its curse wouldn't affect me, then he'd sell it to me, and if I couldn't... well that would be punishment enough. I took it out of its saya and tossed it in the air. It felt like my whole body was a magnet repelling it as it fell, and the blade just went right past my arm. Embedded itself in the hardwood floor." Zoro grinned; for all the idiocy of his 19 year old self, he still always felt a resurgence of pride after telling that story. "Anyway, he sold it to me. I guess I just scared him so bad he remembered my name."

Sanji nodded, and stayed perfectly still as Zoro leaned over to give him a kiss of thanks, which he accepted with an air of smugness.

"Thank you," Zoro whispered.

"Its name is Yubashiri," Sanji said. He stared down at it, and seemed unable to hold himself back from stroking a thumb over the end cap. "I think I was really lucky to find it."

"It's something special alright," said Zoro. "Something pure to join the problem children."

"Problem children?" Sanji inquired.

"Yeah. Neither Shusui or Sandai Kitetsu came into my life without stress. There's just something about the two of them that makes them less easy to wield." Zoro lifted the katana out of the case and tested the balance in his hand. "It's light. Might be a little hard to get used to at first but... it reminds me of Kuina's."

Sanji tilted his head. "Is that a good thing?"

"Oh yeah. She's the legitimate child, so even if Koshiro rarely sees fit to respect her as a person, he still passed it on to her. It's been in the family for over two centuries, and it's been taken such good care of that it probably won't fall out of use for another two."

Sanji sighed in relief.

"Your turn then," Zoro said, placing the katana back into its case with great care and reverence.

Sanji anxiously pushed the tissue paper aside and lifted out the knife roll. Noticing the heaviness of it, he immediately untied the leather strips holding it together.

He brushed his fingers over the handle of a knife, and drew it out of its space. Then he slid the sheath off and his mouth dropped open. "Holy _shit_ ," he whispered, and Zoro found himself smiling proudly.

"Your dad helped me out. And weirdly, my sister in law."

"They're fucking gorgeous," Sanji said, tracing the waves of the hamon with a fingertip. "I want to use them right now."

Zoro could do nothing but watch as Sanji clutched the roll to his chest and ran into the kitchen to get started. He got up to follow, but tripped on the same piece of tissue paper so many times that he finally just stopped and picked up all the discarded wrappings to take with him.

In the kitchen, Sanji already had bacon strips in a pan and was chopping up onions at a near fever pitch.

"They're perfect," Sanji said as he noticed Zoro come in. "They're almost the same weight as my old knives, so I won't need to be doing a lot of adjusting."

Zoro nodded, pleased, and tucked the wrapping paper into the trash can. "What are you making?"

"Quiche with caramelized onions, bacon, and smoked cheddar. Home fries, fresh fruit salad, Nutella-stuffed french toast... plain for you. I think that's about it."

"Are you even going to be able to finish all that in an hour?"

"Yeah, it should mostly be done by the time everybody starts getting here."

"Do you need me to help?"

Sanji immediately pulled the knife roll closer to himself and shook his head. "No. You stay away from these."

Zoro inched ever closer, prepared to annoy the fuck out of Sanji. "I already touched them."

"Never again."

"My fingerprints are all over them."

Sanji scowled and wiped at the handle of one with his thumb. "I'll clean them later."

Finally, Zoro was right behind Sanji, and he used the half inch of height he had on him, plus the muscle and general surplus of mass to push Sanji out of the way and grab the knife roll.

"OI! YOU PUT THAT DOWN!" Sanji yelled, torn between flipping the bacon and trying to follow Zoro.

"I bought it, I deserve to be able to _look_."

"You already had plenty of time to look! Plus it was a gift for _me_ , you don't technically have any claim over it anymore!"

Zoro smirked as he held the knives up above his head, keeping Sanji from getting them until he finally gave up and beat his fist against Zoro's chest. "You're such a fucking caveman!"

Chuckling, Zoro deposited them on the island and instead wrapped his arms around Sanji's waist to draw him into a hard meeting of lips and tongue.

"I really don't like you anymore," Sanji said after they had parted. Still, he stayed right where he was, legs between Zoro's thighs, putting all of his weight on him.

"No take backs."

"Too late, it's already taken back. Pack your things and leave."

"The bacon's about to burn," Zoro replied, rather romantically if he had to say so himself.

Sanji leapt back and quickly transferred the bacon from the pan to a plate. He put another couple strips in, then started whisking together the batter for French toast and chopping up fruit.

Eventually Zoro got tired of standing and sat down on a bar stool, watching as Sanji continued to move about the kitchen briskly, barely slowing down even as a half hour passed.

Several minutes later, distraction came in the form of his phone ringing though. One glance at it told him his day was probably about to be ruined.

"Hello."

"Would you call this brat off?" Smoker said.

"Merry Christmas to you too," Zoro replied, settling down a little. Sanji turned an eye to him, making a questioning face, and Zoro mouthed ' _boss_ ' at him in explanation. There probably wasn't a problem - if there was, Smoker would have started with that. He wasn't the kind of man to beat around the bush.

A rush of air filled Zoro's ear as Smoker presumably let out a cloud of smoke. "Yeah, yeah," he said. "He brought me lunch and a message and now he's walkin' back and forth outside my office door."

"Maybe he has something to say to you." Zoro fidgeted with the drawstring on his pants as he watched Sanji cut a neat slit in the top of each slice of French bread he had laying on the sideboard. He propped them open with his fingers, then piped a bit of Nutella into each one.

"Well if he has somethin' to say, he should damn well spit it out!" Smoker yelled loudly.

Zoro pulled the phone slightly away from his ear to avoid the worst of it. "Because you make yourself seem so approachable."

It wasn't exactly the way a lot of people talked to their bosses. Almost everybody at the station was, if not intimidated by their lieutenant, then often keen to avoid him. But Smoker had been Zoro's mentor when he'd first started out, and that was before Smoker had been promoted. Some people saw it as disrespect, but Smoker hated it when people saw him differently for his new position of power. In fact, you were more likely to fall into his bad graces by bringing up his status as lieutenant than by ignoring it.

"Not like it's stopped him before," Smoker griped.

"How are things holding up there?" Zoro asked, switching topics before Smoker could get going in full-out rant mode.

"Fine. I guess even criminals take a break to be with their families on Christmas," Smoker said, sounding darkly amused.

Zoro glanced up to see that Sanji was getting the quiche out of the oven. The sight of him bent over presented several of his more tantalizing assets, and he abruptly cursed Kuina for deciding to have a family Christmas. He could have been spending the entire day in bed with Sanji, and that would have been the greatest gift of all. Fuck seeing his family. That was something he could do anytime.

"Anyway, I wanted to let you know, the fire department recovered the piece of that girl's shirt."

"The fire department did?" he asked, confused.

"Yeah. They've been checkin' out the structural integrity of the surrounding buildings after the arson last month, makin' sure the fire didn't affect them somehow. Said it was in a crawl space. The brat brought it over."

Zoro paused for a moment, thinking hard. "What the hell was the suspect of an assault case doing in one of those buildings? That's clear across town from where he attacked the girl."

"Unless it got there by some other means," Smoker suggested.

"You think somebody's trying to link together two things that aren't actually related."

"I think it's possible. I think these folks'll do anything to bring down another gang if they can claw themselves a little closer to power with it."

"They're doing a sloppy job of it," Zoro replied. There was a knock at the door, and Sanji went off to answer it. "Listen, I'm with Sanji right now, and my family just got here. I'm going to do some thinking about this and I'll get back to you if I figure anything out."

"Yeah, do that," Smoker said. Zoro could hear him breathe out another puff of smoke.

"Don't work yourself too hard," Zoro said. "Make sure you go home on time or else Tashigi'll have your head when she finds out. And you know she will."

"Yeah, yeah. I'll go take care of the brat and get out of here in a couple hours."

"Alright. Bye."

Smoker said goodbye, and they hung up. Zoro took a moment, pushing his palms into his eyes and taking a deep, steadying breath. Wasn't all this bullshit hard enough without some assholes coming in and messing with their evidence?

He stood and walked into the living room, beyond which Kuina and Shakky were tucking their hair back into place after pulling off their hats. Sanji was dutifully taking their coats to hang in the closet, acting charming as ever, and Zoro was convinced he'd probably even kissed their hands or some bullshit.

At last, they stepped out of the hallway and into the living room, where Sanji gestured for them to take a seat, denying any help they offered.

"Where's dad?" Zoro asked as they turned their gazes to him.

"He's bringing the presents up," Kuina replied, rolling her eyes. "I volunteered to, but he's being stubborn as usual."

Sure enough, a few minutes later, there was another knock on the door. Zeff and Koshiro stood together outside of it when Zoro opened it.

"Look who I saw on the way up," Zeff chortled. Koshiro smiled somewhat blankly as he walked inside, not even greeting Zoro.

There was a tension in the room that only their parents seemed not to notice. They spent a pretty decent amount of time catching up with each other, Zeff filling the room with his loud laugh and Koshiro responding much more quietly. Zoro, Kuina, and Shakky stayed in the kitchen with Sanji, and they were all silent and solemn in a way that seemed wrong for a day like this.

Zoro had a feeling that most of the tension was his fault, and he couldn't find it in himself to feel bad about how he reacted to his father. Kuina knew how it was, and Shakky hadn't ever really gotten along with Koshiro either. But they were in Sanji's home, and Zoro did feel bad for potentially making it awkward for him.

That worry drained out of him when Sanji finally finished the meal and handed plates and silverware to Shakky and Kuina, who had offered to set the table.

He came close to Zoro and took him by the arm. "Are you okay?" he whispered.

Zoro made an undecided shrugging motion with his shoulders. "Just... me and Koshiro don't really get along anymore, I guess."

Sanji asked no questions, just rested his lips against Zoro's cheek as he spoke. "That's fine. All you have to do is get through today, and it'll be fine."

It was reassuring enough that some of the tension even seeped out of the apartment.

They settled in for breakfast. Zeff commented on every little nuance of the meal, and soon he and Sanji were trading insults back and forth, though it was clear to Zoro that it was more affectionate ribbing than something meant to hurt. He was well-versed in the kind of relationship the Black men had - one day it was all sunshine and daisies, Zeff giving thinly-veiled compliments to Sanji about his cooking, Sanji looking pleased and proud. The next day it could just as easily be them childishly insulting each others' cooking. The most plentiful days were a combination of the two.

And sure enough, this was one of them. For all that he complained that the fruit salad had too many grapes and not enough cantaloupe, or that the home fries had been cooked just a second too long, he ate every single bite on his plate and went back for seconds. And when he was all done with that, he stretched back and let out a loud burp. "Good one, little eggplant," he thundered.

Sanji shook his head and smiled, helplessly pleased.

Zeff's gaze finally turned to Zoro, who had finished his own second plate and was now poking at Sanji with the tines of his fork every time Sanji wasn't looking. "You," he said. "I see you're still around."

"Yeah. Why wouldn't I be?" Zoro asked. Sanji swatted his hand hard, and when that didn't deter Zoro, he resorted to winding his fingers tightly around the fork so that Zoro couldn't move it.

"Hmph. Of course you would be. That's the point. Always sticking close to my kiddo. Used to piss me off something good, I tell you. Couldn't get a moment of peace between all your fighting. Drawn together like giant goddamn magnets, weren't you. You just refused to stay apart. I guess you're still like that." He paused to take a sip of his coffee. "Ah, well, you treat him good you'll have no complaints from me. So long as I don't have to listen to the two of you bicker over every damn thing."

Zoro glanced over to Sanji, who rolled his eyes the second Zeff looked away. Then they drifted further down the table to Koshiro, who had been mostly silent over breakfast. Occasionally he'd smile or chuckle at something, but he was a man of few emotions and fewer words. About the most he'd said all at once was a thank you to Sanji after he'd finished eating.

Zoro had seen his father getting older through the years with a kind of detached recognition. It seemed to happen suddenly rather than in increments - the wrinkles around his mouth and eyes would set up home on his face one night, and remain. Strands of silver interrupted his black hair, and multiplied like a family growing. And for a long time now, his back had been hunched so it seemed less like the straight, strong foundation it had been when Zoro was a child, and more like a mountain sagging under the weight of the sun sitting atop it every evening.

All at once, it seemed to hit him that the majority of Koshiro's life had already passed by. If it didn't come suddenly and out of nowhere, death would begin its logical approach in another ten years.

Zoro felt weighted down by the realization. He remembered, once upon a time, that even as his own daughter lay close to death's hand, Koshiro had said only that it would touch upon everyone at some point. Could he possibly think the same about his own life? Did it matter so little?

Maybe to a man who had the happiness taken from him long ago. But Zoro wasn't like that. He couldn't imagine ever caring so little. There were so many things he wanted to experience in life, so many things he wanted to achieve, and he cared with a fierceness that set him in distinct contrast to Koshiro.

He found it pitiful. And pity made it easier for him to hate his father.

* * *

They gathered in the living room after the table had been cleared and the dishes washed. Kuina, Shakky, and Koshiro took up the sofa, Zeff seated himself in the armchair, and Sanji and Zoro sat cross-legged on the floor next to each other.

Zeff had seen the knives in the kitchen while they'd tidied up, and proceeded to admire them with a comment to Zoro that he'd done a good job. And now Kuina kept glancing curiously over to the case propped on the coffee table.

Zoro rolled his eyes and finally told her to just _open_ it, and when she did, Koshiro's eyes slid over to look at it as well.

"Hmm," he said, in his paper-thin voice. "A good piece. Only a step below our Wadou. May I?"

Zoro nodded and watched as Koshiro lifted it out of the case. He unsheathed the blade a couple inches, and eyed the edge. "Good and sharp. You'll wield it well."

If he had been younger, Zoro would have said some bullshit about doing his best, but as it was, all he did was thank Koshiro.

Presents were passed around, and subsequently torn into.

There was the exchange of the traditional not-quite gag gift of a sex shop gift card for Shakky and Kuina, which he hated thinking about every time he got it, but it was still too hilarious to let go of at this point. The only reason he'd done it in the first place was to apologize after the time he'd somehow managed to step on a vibrator they'd just left laying around as if that was acceptable. Clearly it was their fault, and it had mentally scarred him for life, but they'd no doubt use the card and he wouldn't have to think about it any further. And from there, it had just become a running joke.

Zeff got his guilty pleasure gift box of smoked sausage and various cheeses plus his favorite imported rosé, and Koshiro got a basket full of all of his favorite Japanese snacks homemade by Sanji, along with a new tsuka for Nidai Kitetsu after the last one had begun to crack down the center. This one would hold for much longer.

Zoro parted with a bottle of Johnnie Walker Quest from Kuina, Shakky, and Koshiro, plus a nice bottle of shochu from Zeff. And Sanji was practically beside himself with joy as Kuina presented him with several containers of gourmet coffee beans, even more so when Zeff handed him a large box that turned out to contain a brand new bread maker.

They wound down, and Sanji started making a fuss about preparing lunch, though almost everyone protested and told him not to.

Koshiro bowed out shortly after, saying that he wanted to be home before the snow prevented him from leaving, then Zeff left while saying something about getting back to his _lady_ , perverse smile on his face the whole time.

At last, it was just Sanji, Zoro, Kuina, and Shakky. With the loss of their elders, it had become much more informal, and any tension that had remained was now gone.

"What does it say about the two of you that you buy each other sharp objects for Christmas?" Shakky wondered at length. Sanji had gotten drinks for everyone, and she was the only one who'd asked for alcohol, so he'd poured a glass of red wine for her and one glass became two, and now she was on her fourth, looking none the worse for wear. Typically, she was the only person Zoro knew who could keep up with him when it came to drinking.

"What does it say about you that you bought me a $500 bottle of alcohol?" Zoro countered.

"It says that I know you very well," Shakky said with a wink.

Kuina rolled her eyes. "It says that you think _exactly_ the way he does."

Sanji was being strangely quiet. Zoro glanced up from his place on the floor by the armchair to see him sleepily watching Kuina and Shakky.

"How did you two meet?" he asked after a few minutes, obviously having finally found the courage to ask what was on his mind.

"Years ago, right before Halloween, she came to my bar looking all upset and proceeded to try to get blackout drunk," Shakky began, chuckling.

Kuina scowled and shook her head. "I wasn't _upset_ and I wasn't trying to get blackout drunk."

"She said that her boyfriend broke up with her and she thought that he had been planning to propose." Shakky had another gulp of wine and placed her glass down so she could put her hand on Kuina's thigh instead. "Anyway, she started getting all wobbly after a drink or two and I told her I was cutting her off, so she got all pissy and said I wasn't the boss of her. Even though I didn't give her a single drop to drink after that, she stayed until we closed, so I took her back to her apartment and she asked me to stay with her. She was pretty much passed out before we even got inside. I put her in bed and slept on the chair in her room in case she woke up sick."

"You're making me sound a lot worse than I was!" Kuina protested.

"Who was the sober person in this situation again?" Shakky asked. Kuina's shoulders dropped and she sighed, relenting completely. "I stayed with her the whole night, and the next morning she asked me who the hell I was. Didn't remember a damn thing about the night before. I told her about it over breakfast at a diner down the street from her apartment and I guess you could say that was our first date. Next thing I know, we're engaged and moving in together."

"You could really tell that you wanted to be with each other forever after a couple months?" Sanji asked. It wasn't in a condescending manner, more curious and innocently astounded than anything.

"Oh yes. She might seem all mature and stern on the outside, but she opened up so easily. You might say I made an honest woman of her," Kuina said with an extremely exaggerated wink.

Shakky laughed and nudged her elbow against Kuina. "I'm nearly fifty. At this point it's pretty easy to tell when you've got a lasting connection on your hands or not, regardless of only knowing each other for a little while."

"Besides, at least we didn't sleep together before we'd even gone on our first date," Kuina said, giving them both a critical eye.

"It took me more than a decade to work up the courage to go that far with him," Sanji said, utterly at ease with what he was saying. Zoro was horrified that Kuina and Shakky were hearing this. "I saw the chance, and decided to take it. I was sick of being a coward."

The conversation turned in other directions, winding down several paths for a few more hours. At some point, Sanji brought out sandwiches, and they ate in the living room surrounded by wrapping paper and too many bottles of alcohol. Then they kindly helped clean up, and started getting ready to leave until Sanji got caught up in talking to Shakky about her bar and whether or not it was difficult to run, which kept them there for another hour.

But they finally left, and Zoro heaved out a sound of relief. They went immediately to the bedroom, making a pitstop in the bathroom only to brush their teeth and wash their faces. Of course Sanji decided to hog the sink, so by the time he left, Zoro was only just getting to brush his teeth.

He drifted into the bedroom, toothbrush in his mouth. Sanji was stepping out of his track pants, and glanced up at Zoro quickly. "Let's never have family over again," he said.

Zoro snorted and managed to dribble a little bit of toothpaste down onto his chest. He went back into the bathroom to clean it up, spat, and put the toothbrush back.

"Yeah, that was definitely... a shitshow," he said as he came back into the room.

Sanji was curled under the sheets now, still wearing Zoro's hoodie. "They're just as bad as they were twelve years ago. Worse, even."

"Believe me, I know. I've had to deal with them this whole time." Zoro slid into the bed and watched as Sanji's eyes scanned his face in the darkness, lips slowly lifting into a smile.

"Thanks," he said, blowing out a breath. "For everything. Especially for the knives, but... it was really nice to spend Christmas with someone I actually like for a change."

"My pleasure." Zoro leaned forward and took Sanji's lips in a kiss, hand curling on his hip. He felt like he'd barely gotten to touch Sanji at all today, but he intended to make up for that.

"What's your problem?" Sanji asked when he'd pulled back, amusement coloring his tone.

"Do you ever just sort of miss someone even when they're right there?" Zoro said, stroking his fingers over the jut of Sanji's hipbone.

"I'm getting pretty familiar with the feeling lately, yeah," Sanji replied.

Zoro sighed, then began brushing kisses up and down the column of Sanji's throat.

"Oh fuck, I just remembered something," Sanji said, jumping up. He managed to knock Zoro in the chin with his collarbone, and Zoro groaned in pain as he bit his tongue.

But there was no one to witness his agony since the room had already been vacated, and Zoro lay in silence, waiting for Sanji to return.

He was back a moment later with something small and rectangular in his hands, which he tossed at Zoro.

It landed lightly on his chest, and he reached an arm out from under the comforter to pick it up. His eyebrows furrowed as he realized that it was a picture frame. "What's all this about?"

"It's from Thanksgiving," said Sanji, tapping one of the lamps on so Zoro could see it. "Now you can have some pictures of us at your place."

It wasn't the best picture ever. The shot was partially blocked by someone standing in front of the camera, but the part that was there was enough to let Zoro know that he could ignore how imperfect it was.

In it, he and Sanji were sitting at the dinner table, and Zoro had obviously been in the middle of one of his naps. Sanji was leaning against his shoulder, and his gaze was turned somewhere out of the frame.

The content smile on Sanji's face was what made it for Zoro. It could have been about anything, but Zoro chose to believe that it was because they were close, because it had been a good day that they had spent _together_.

"Thanks," he said, and leaned over to brush his lips against Sanji's. "You did good this Christmas."

Sanji was smug, and he pushed his fingers between Zoro's underneath the covers. "I always do good on Christmas. I'm amazing at giving people what they want."

"Okay, don't get too full of yourself."

"I'm not full of myself. I'm just glad I did right by you."

Zoro placed the picture on the nightstand and turned the lamp off. It was true that Sanji hadn't always done right by him. He hadn't even _usually_ done right by him. But things were getting better. They were already so much better than Zoro even dared hope for.


	7. A Change is Gonna Come

Thursday night, Zoro had gathered all his scattered clothes and gifts from around the apartment, packed up, and gone home.

It had been a good few days, just getting to be with Sanji throughout all the mundane chores and the lulls of boredom where neither of them felt like doing anything but laying on the couch together. And it was almost too easy to fall into the illusion that life with Sanji might always be like that, or that someday they would exist in the same house so effortlessly.

But there were things he missed about being in his own home. As much as he loved waking up next to Sanji, going to sleep next to him, constantly being surrounded by his scent in the sheets, he missed his own bed. He missed being lazy and not having to clean up after himself. He missed not having the sun shining right in his goddamn face every morning when he woke up. He missed his couch, he missed the comfortable lived-in feeling of his house, which Sanji's apartment didn't have. He missed his crappy shower with terrible water pressure, and he missed being able to see more than sky out of the bedroom window.

And he just needed some time to himself. Being around Sanji didn't make him feel stifled by his presence so much as stifled by his own feelings. It was draining; all the things he couldn't say, all of the things he _could_ say, but knew he shouldn't. He just didn't have the time to sit in silence and _think_ his way through the feelings. It was a constant barrage of ' _feel this, feel this, feel this_ ' and frankly he wanted a few moments to feel perfectly and utterly _empty_ , in the good way.

This wasn't something that was unique to Sanji, either. Zoro was just a solitary sort, not altogether cut out to be seen, heard, spoken to at all hours of the day. At some point throughout every relationship he'd ever been in, there had been times where he just needed to be _away_.

So yeah, being back home felt good. It was a little bizarre to return to work the next day, but it also meant it was time to get down to business, and he'd been anticipating that in the back of his mind for the past day and a half.

Except he was disappointed. When he and Tashigi went over the lab analysis, they found there were no anomalies in the fabric that Ace had brought over. No hair, no skin cells, nothing. Zoro wasn't surprised, and Tashigi wasn't either. Things were never that easy, but he'd been hoping. Despite their shared theories and Smoker's input, they were no closer to an answer than they'd been earlier in the week.

At the very least, they had taken every route they could possibly think of. More often than not, cases took a long time to solve, and he wasn't even sure _what_ he was looking for in this one. It was like having the answer instead of the question, and it was a shitty, unacceptable answer at that. He found that it lingered in his mind far longer than it should have.

* * *

The following Monday was his bimestrial therapy appointment, a concept which still felt strange even after all these years. Dr. Beckman's office was nearly as known to him as his own office at this point, and his eyes slid past pictures and decor so familiar that they didn't even register in his brain as anything but background noise.

"How have things been?" Dr. Beckman asked once they'd gotten settled, he in his usual armchair, Zoro in the squishy, entirely too comfortable couch.

"Good," Zoro said.

Dr. Beckman cleared his throat. "Any trouble with episodes?" The line of questioning was cursory, the same stepping stones of conversation that always started their sessions.

Usually he'd answer with a truthful _no_. Today, it was different. "A little."

"Hm. Why is that?"

"Do you remember Sanji?" Zoro asked. Their first few sessions, Dr. Beckman had coaxed his past out of him, and with the explanation of Kuina's accident, he'd had to talk about Sanji too. It was like a flood breaking after that point; he'd talked about his childhood with Sanji, about how they'd been practically obsessed with fighting against each other, and later, about how he hadn't actually felt as antagonistic toward Sanji as he let on.

"Yes. What about him?"

Zoro took a moment, figuring out how to word what he wanted to say. "I met him again last month."

"And seeing him caused a flashback?"

"Not exactly..."

Dr. Beckman waited patiently for him to continue. He seemed fairly accustomed to Zoro having to figure things out for himself at this point, and always accommodated it.

"We're in a relationship now, I guess," he said shiftily after a minute or so.

Dr. Beckman let out an acknowledging noise that was halfway between amusement and concern. "You guess?"

"We are," he clarified.

"So what is it that's causing you trouble?" Dr. Beckman asked. His eyes were sharp and firm on Zoro, refusing to let him back away from what he'd started, and his mouth was turned down just barely into a frown. It caused the X-shaped scar along the left side of his face to pucker slightly.

"He remembered when I went back to Maryland for him." It felt like a relief to finally say it, though he wasn't sure why. Maybe because it sometimes felt like he and Sanji were the only ones who knew just how important those couple weeks were, which tended to bottle up inside of Zoro, and saying it now reminded him that Dr. Beckman knew the emotional basics of what Zoro had been feeling then. "I was fine that night but when I remembered it the next morning, it hit me full-on."

"And how did he react?"

"He... didn't see it." Zoro scratched a little piece of something sticky off of his pants, eyes averted.

"You're saying he doesn't know about it." Dr. Beckman's tone wasn't judgmental, but the way he worded it certainly implied that he was disappointed.

"It's not his business," Zoro said. He could share a lot with Sanji, but he couldn't share everything. And this was one of those things that Zoro _hated_ to spring on other people. It wasn't their burden to deal with, it was his.

"I suppose not," Dr. Beckman relented. "It's up to you who to tell and when to tell them. But remember, he'll feel better to know that you trust him."

Zoro said nothing, wondering how much not telling Sanji had to do with trust and how much had to do with his own stubbornness.

"How's work?" It was the last of the prompting questions, and their conversation would go into all kinds of uncharted territory after this. He almost dreaded it, knowing that his new relationship would come up.

For the meantime though, he could talk about his job. Because if there was one civilian out there that Zoro didn't (or couldn't) mind speaking to about work, it was his therapist. From the very beginning, Dr. Beckman had been upfront about the fact that, in order to know the full scope of Zoro's problems, he had to know _everything_ that Zoro was comfortable with sharing. And considering that Zoro knew how serious confidentiality laws were, he didn't live in fear of anything getting out. "It's alright. We've had a lot of shit happening lately that isn't adding up though. And my partner hasn't been feeling very safe, so I'm not sure how much she's able to put into the job." He had to admit privately to himself that he'd been just as distracted by Sanji, so he probably didn't have any room to talk.

"Oh?" Dr. Beckman seemed suddenly curious, far more than he'd usually let on to. "If you don't mind, what happened?"

"Her home was broken into. Whoever it was took some files. She's been having panic attacks, and most the time she doesn't even want to be in her apartment anymore.I guess it's normal to not be able to forget that kind of thing very fast."

"She's quite similar to you, isn't she?"

Zoro tilted his head against the back of the sofa, thinking. "I guess she is, in some ways."

"Has she spoken to anyone about her fears?"

"She's been getting pretty close with one of the other station's lieutenants," Zoro said, thinking of how Bellemere had been perfectly comfortable with Tashigi the night of the break-in.

"Hm. How are _you_ taking the incident?"

Zoro didn't know how to respond to that. It wasn't really his business, so he didn't particularly have any personal feelings on it. But of course he cared about her, and wanted to make sure she felt safe. It just didn't feel like his place to react to it. "It bothers me for her sake. It bothers me for the sake of everyone I love, knowing how easy it is for people to break in."

"You don't feel unsafe personally? You're not afraid that this kind of thing could happen to you?"

He thought of his katana sitting in the practice room, and wondered if he should move them beside the bed. Even if he didn't, he could fight the average person off easily with his strength. "No. I know I'll be safe."

"There are people that you're afraid you won't be able to protect?"

His first thought was Sanji, but then he reconsidered. Sanji could protect himself. He was strong. Zoro didn't worry about him being caught off his guard. What he _did_ worry about was that being connected to Zoro would put him in some kind of danger that he normally wouldn't be. That someone out there would take notice, and devise a plan, and let it roll from there until Zoro was helpless to stop it. "Of course."

"Do you think it's possible you're worrying too much about something that won't happen?"

Zoro wondered. The likelihood of something like this happening was never zero; that much had been proven to him just recently. So no, he didn't think he was worrying too much about something that wouldn't happen. He was being prepared exactly enough about something that he now knew was not at all impossible. Over anything else, he always trusted his instincts.

* * *

Zoro had assumed that any kind of New Years party would take place at Sanji's apartment, which was why he felt justified in his annoyance when, instead of getting to sit down on the couch upon arrival and wait for everyone to show up, he was pushed out of the apartment, down the street to the subway station, onto a train, then dragged out into Nolita 20 minutes later. Sanji led him down several streets, making turns so often it was dizzying, and up a couple flights of stairs inside of an apartment building. But at last, they came to a stop in front of a bright red door with the number ' _82_ ' nailed on in brass, and Sanji raised a fist to knock on it.

The door was opened a few moments later by Luffy, whose cheeks were bulging with food. "Oh hey guysh!" he said, bits of _something_ flying from his mouth. Sanji grimaced and Zoro was hard-pressed not to laugh. "Come in!"

They did, Sanji continuing to lead Zoro just as confidently as he had throughout their entire journey. It was obvious he'd been here before, but Zoro hadn't, and he found that the whole place looked nothing like he'd imagined Luffy's home would. It was tidy, tastefully decorated in earthen tones, and there were no boxing posters or memorabilia anywhere in sight. Then it struck him. This wasn't _Luffy's_ apartment. It was Luffy and _Nami's_ apartment. He didn't know why that surprised him - it was only natural she and Luffy would live together at this point.

More surprising was just how many people were packed into the room. He spotted Usopp and Kaya doing some kind of awkward shuffle together, and Nojiko and Keimi were sitting in the nearby corner laughing over something on Nojiko's phone. Nami was directing Ace and Chopper to bring platters of finger foods out to the living room, while Robin and Franky were leaned up against a wall looking like chaperones at a middle school dance. Brook was manning a laptop hooked up to the speakers, which were playing some kind of tropical/rock 'n' roll fusion that was far too summery for the outside weather. Then there was Vivi, who was in the midst of a conversation with two tall dark-haired men, and Franky's entire posse of demolition and construction workers padded out the room quite a bit.

Even being a person who wasn't actively bothered by crowds of people, Zoro was beginning to feel mildly claustrophobic. He couldn't imagine wanting to come if Sanji hadn't dragged him along, but at the very least, everyone was already there.

"How long do we have to stay?" he asked, gripping Sanji's arm tightly to keep him standing as one of Franky's friends nearly bowled him over on the way to the center of the room, where several others were trying to start some kind of synced dance.

"Don't worry," Sanji replied. He was pushed closer to Zoro by a woman with a squarish afro, and had to put his hands on Zoro's chest to steady himself. "I think we'll be out of here before midnight." He winked exaggeratedly, sliding his hands down to squeeze Zoro's waist.

Zoro raised an eyebrow but dissented. If that was Sanji's code for ' _we're going home early to fuck_ 'then he was completely alright with it.

By increments, they got drawn apart from each other. Sanji went to actually be sociable, while Zoro mostly hung out with Nojiko and Chopper, since they tended to be equally as reserved as he was.

It turned out he'd been wrong when he assumed everyone had arrived. Around 10:30, two very loud and very gothy drag queens showed up and riled Franky's friends even more, so bad that Zoro finally retreated to the empty balcony just to avoid being shoved anywhere he went.

He could still hear the music and shouting from outside, but it was muffled and less headache-inducing. It felt nice to be in the cold air - he'd not realized just how hot it was getting in there. Deciding to hide out for a little while, he leaned on the balcony railing and watched cars roll by on the street below.

Sanji appeared a few moments later, face pale and expression set in either shock or horror, maybe both. He slid onto the bench near to Zoro, and with shaking fingers, lit a cigarette.

"What's up?" Zoro asked, turning his back to the railing so he could face Sanji.

Sanji took a long drag in and let it out slowly before speaking. "Iva's here."

"Who's that?"

"Let's just say last time I was left alone in a room with him, I ended up in panties and a cheerleading costume." Sanji shuddered, and somehow Zoro could tell it wasn't because of the cold.

He couldn't help the perverse grin that spread across his face. "That's something I'd like to see."

Sanji scowled and took another drag on his cigarette. "Never gonna happen."

"That's too bad," Zoro said, still smiling wickedly.

He watched as Sanji finished off his cigarette, content to stay silent. The street down below was nearly as populated as it would be in the daytime, and people were beginning to set off small fireworks. The first bang of one going off made Zoro jump, but he relaxed once he'd figured out what it was. "Do you want to get out of here?" he asked, suddenly wanting to be down there with people who were doing more than getting drunk and dancing too close to each other.

"In a bit," Sanji said, but it wasn't a rebuke if his smile meant anything. "Try to enjoy having friends for a little while."

"I'd enjoy it a lot more if they'd spend less time yelling and jumping all over me."

"Don't act like you aren't all pleased every time Chopper gravitates toward you. You're like his big brother."

"I don't mind Chopper. He's a good kid. And he's quiet most of the time."

"It's just everyone else?" Sanji asked with a laugh. He patted the empty part of the bench beside himself, and Zoro sat down almost too obediently for dignity's sake.

"Robin's alright too. Nami is kinda witchy most the time-"

"Don't talk about my sweet Nami that way!" Sanji interrupted almost as soon as the words were out of Zoro's mouth.

"-But she's cool enough when she isn't yelling at me. Usopp and Luffy are way too excitable with each other, Franky has weird friends-"

"You don't want to be around Franky because he has weird friends?"

"Nah, it's because Franky gets everyone else all wound up. On his own he tends to be alright. And put Brook in a room with anyone and next thing you know real life becomes a musical," Zoro finished. Despite his complaints, he loved all of them. He'd never had friends as unconditionally accepting as they were. At this point, he considered them to be more like his family.

"Mm. Any complaints about me?" Sanji wondered, lighting another cigarette.

Zoro tilted his head to the side and thought for a second. "If you'd asked me when we were fourteen, I could've given you a list. I guess you've grown out of most of your worst traits."

"Well if you ask me, you're kind of an anti-social asshole and you keep yourself really closed up," Sanji said, mock-serious.

"Is that right," Zoro wondered. He felt Sanji's hand drop to his thigh and rest there, so he placed his own on top of it.

"Yeah. And you drink too much."

Zoro laughed. "It's a good thing you got to know me again before getting into this. Oh wait."

Sanji's fingers dug into his thigh playfully. "You know, you're a lot less easy to get a rise out of than you used to be."

"Reacting is tiresome."

The balcony door opened before Sanji could reply, and a purple-haired, heavily made-up man stuck his head out. Zoro felt Sanji immediately tense by his side.

"Sanji," said the man, in a silky tone. "How _lovely_ to see you again."

Sanji's hand had a death grip on Zoro's thigh at this point. "You stay away!"

The man completely ignored his words and stepped out onto the balcony. Zoro could now see that he was wearing fishnets, a cape, and some kind of strange leotard, and he was holding a wine glass in one gloved hand. "Who's your friend?" the man asked, batting his fake eyelashes at Zoro.

Sanji glared. "He's not my friend, stay away from him."

"If he's not your friend, then you shouldn't mind." The man was smiling widely and combined with all the make-up, it was a somewhat fearsome sight.

"Iva, go back inside! I don't want him to get anymore dirt on me! And I want _you_ having dirt on me even _less_."

Iva looked like there would be no greater pleasure in the world than to stay here and piss Sanji off. He placed his wine glass on the low wicker table, then sat on one of the deck chairs and crossed his legs primly, folding his hands over his knees. His gaze had switched from Sanji to Zoro, and there was some uncanny aspect to it that made Zoro feel like Iva was looking far deeper into him than a human should be able to. "Hello darling. Would you like to tell me who are you since Sanji is just so _impolite_?"

"Zoro," he answered.

" _Don't engage him_ ," Sanji hissed lowly.

"And Zoro, who are you to Sanji?" Iva asked.

" _Don't say it_ ," Sanji hissed again, as if his hand that had moved to cover Zoro's mouth wouldn't prevent him from saying anything.

He shrugged helplessly at Iva.

"Well, since he's got you all busy, let me tell you a little story to pass the time," Iva said.

"No. No stories!" said Sanji.

As ever, Iva ignored him and took a sip from his wine glass before continuing. "When our dear Sanji came back to America, my darling disciple Bentham called me up from France and asked me to keep an eye on him. Only before I could get to him myself, Luffy did, and next thing I knew, they were the best of friends. Now I've known Luffy forever, his father and I go very far back - and I see that look on your face darling, I do look quite young for my age, I know. Don't feel you need to tell me. I've known Luffy since he was born and I knew he would take care of our Sanji here."

He paused, and Zoro turned his eyes away from Iva to see how Sanji was taking it. He looked torn between hoisting Zoro over his shoulder and carrying him into the apartment or tossing himself over the balcony railing.

In the meantime, Iva went on. "But I wanted to meet him myself, and so I arranged to have dinner at his father's restaurant after they got themselves settled. I had heard his cooking was quite good but, well, I found myself disappointed! Where was the reinvigorating feeling? Where was the _strength_ of his food? I challenged him to a duel! If he won, I would teach him how to be even _better_." Here Iva chuckled to himself. "He's such a persistent man! Wouldn't stop until he won, and even then, he would trail after me wanting to know even _more_. Well I have a very gentle temperament, you see, but I'll admit I started to get a bit ruffled by all his bothering. So I told him that if he could take one whole night out with me, I would tell him the rest of what I knew. He even let me dress him up."

Sanji's face was bright red even in the darkness.

"So easily embarrassed, this one," Iva said. He leaned forward to pinch Sanji's cheek between his fingers and tugged lightly. "He was so lovely! I've still got the pictures, if you'd like to see them..."

"Well, it's been slightly less than pleasant to see you, Iva, but we have to be on our way now!" Sanji said, forcefully pulling Zoro off the bench.

"Bye darling! It was nice to meet you, Zoro!"

Zoro shot him a thumbs up and let himself be dragged back inside, where the party hadn't wound down a single bit in their absence. Luffy jumped from the arm of the loveseat into Zoro's arms nearly as soon as the door was closed, and Zoro didn't even have time to take his hand from Sanji's, forced to clutch Luffy tightly around the waist with one arm to keep him from falling.

"Zoro! I thought you'd left!" Luffy said, slowly sliding down out of Zoro's grasp. "I have something for you!" He dug around in his pockets, tongue sticking out to one side in concentration, and finally whipped out a pair of tickets from his shorts, triumphant smile in place. "For my match. On January..."

"17th," Nami chipped in from her seat on the other side of the loveseat.

"Yeah, January 17th! So make sure you come. I'm gonna kick that guy's ass!"

Zoro nodded. "Yeah, definitely."

Luffy gave him another wide grin, then meandered off to join Chopper and Ace, who were stuffing the last of the cream puffs into their mouths.

Nami, however, stayed behind. "If you don't actually plan to come, you better give those tickets back," she said. "I can sell them for a pretty good price."

"Nah, we'll be there," said Zoro.

Her face fell slightly at the idea that she was losing out on money, but she nodded and gave him a look that meant she wasn't as disappointed in him as she could have been. "Good, then. He'll be happy to have you there supporting him, and that's all that really matters."

Zoro blinked as she stood up and disappeared down the hallway. He glanced to the side, ready to give Sanji a ' _what was that all about_ ' look, only to realize that Sanji was nowhere to be seen.

Apparently he hadn't gone far though, because after a couple minutes of maneuvering around dancing people, Zoro caught sight of his blonde head right outside the kitchen. He shoved through the people in his way as politely as possible, and when Sanji noticed Zoro by his elbow, he shot him a smile. "Ready to go?"

"Uh, yeah. I guess."

They took a few minutes saying their goodbyes, and to give Ace quick wishes of a happy early birthday, then headed out.

"Why are we leaving early, anyway?" Zoro asked. "You were all about being with friends a little while ago."

"You'll see," Sanji said with a secretive smile.

Neither of them had had a drink throughout the night, but Zoro felt somewhat drunk on adrenaline as Sanji dragged him through crowds of loud people on the sidewalks. They hopped on the N line going north into Midtown rather than south to Brooklyn, and Zoro resolved to just go with it.

But when they got off at Times Square and emerged out of the station into the street, he sighed. There were people as far as the eye could see, and the crush of bodies was already intolerable. The whole reason he'd requested to have the night off work was to _avoid_ this.

"You're kidding, right?" he asked Sanji, who was grinning in a very evil fashion.

"Nope!"

"Please tell me we're not actually here to watch the ball drop."

"We're definitely here to watch the ball drop," he called back, pulling Zoro through the throng of bodies so swiftly that he barely would have had time to apologize to everyone he knocked into even if he wanted to.

Zoro sighed again. The sound could barely be heard over the chatter of thousands of people, and the movement caused his chest to push against Sanji's back.

They emerged out onto 42nd Street and Sanji continued to push his way through the tide of people. Even when they got on Broadway, it was was like trying to move against a tsunami, but Zoro could do little more than just trail after Sanji, who was too determined to give up at this point.

Finally they came to a halt in the V of Broadway and 7th, and Sanji tilted his head up. "We didn't miss it, did we?"

Zoro pulled his phone out of his pocket and checked the screen. "Nope. 11:58. Still time enough to leave."

Sanji's hand gripped tighter around his. "Humor me this once."

"Yeah, humor him!" said a young man standing near them. Zoro glared at him until the man averted his eyes, embarrassed. Then he wrapped his arms around the small of Sanji's back and leaned their foreheads together, so that the only thing they could see was each other, and not annoying people who felt like it was their right to intrude.

"We'll go drinking after this, yeah?" Sanji said. "Let me just be kinda sappy. I've always wanted to have a kiss when the ball drops."

"That's what she said," Zoro said, unable to resist.

Sanji burst into laughter and nudged his knee against Zoro's thigh punishingly. "This year only, okay? Next year we can stay in."

Zoro sighed softly. He knew he couldn't deny Sanji anything, not when he brought up the idea that Zoro would be his _first_ at something, and especially not when he implied that there would be a _next_ time too.

He could hear the timer counting down in the background. People were shouting, bumping into them from all sides, but he'd never been less aware of a crowd in his life. Sanji was gazing up at him with those pretty eyes, pupils blown wide in the darkness so that only a tiny ring of blue showed. His hands were on Zoro's shoulders, and they were close enough to breathe each other's air. It was intimate in a way that shouldn't have been possible with so many strangers around. Zoro felt the moment stretch on and on, until he became aware of the shouted numbers reaching single digits.

" _Nine... eight... seven..._ "

Sanji's hands rose from his shoulders and cupped his cheeks.

" _Six... five... four..._ "

Zoro's slid away from Sanji's back to rest lightly on his sides, fingers stroking through the fabric.

" _Three... two... one!_ "

They moved close, lips touching for a bare second before they seemed to dive into each other. Their tongues brushed together, teeth occasionally scraped a little too hard, and it _felt_ perfect even if it wasn't. Zoro was hyper-aware of Sanji's stubble burning against his face, his fingers tracing the boundaries of Zoro's hairline, the press of his left thigh against Zoro's right. Every moment of this, he committed to memory.

It took awhile for the world to come back into existence when they pulled apart, but it did so all at once. There was the rush of loud cheers from the crowd, confetti floating down over everything, and fireworks shooting off in the sky.

Sanji smiled at him and finally dropped his hands from Zoro's face, but couldn't seem to resist placing one more kiss on his mouth. "Let's get out of here," he said, nearly yelling to be heard.

Zoro nodded, and they made their way through the press up Broadway and onto 47th toward Hell's Kitchen. "We don't have to go drinking if you don't want to," he said when they were finally far enough away that the volume had dropped to something resembling reasonable.

"Are you kidding? The reason people get New Years off is to spend the day nursing their hangovers. And to lull you into a false sense of security."

Zoro caught Sanji's hand in his as they walked. "False sense of security about what?"

"That the year's going to be great. Just think about it, if you had to go into work on the first day of the year, you'd be thinking about how much bullshit it is and how that's all you're going to be doing for the next year. But if you have the day off, you'll sit at home and relax and think about how the year is going to be awesome." They pulled to a stop at an intersection, and Sanji fished out a cigarette and lit it with his free hand.

"I spent the first day of last year at work. It wasn't an awful year either," said Zoro.

Sanji's hand tightened on his as they crossed the street. "But could it have been better?"

Last year had been highs and lows, Zoro could admit. He'd started it out still feeling lost over a breakup, and slowly became a little more introverted. Then Ace had really started making an effort to pull him out of himself, and he'd made good friends. He'd had some truly awful moments at work, so bad he found himself wanting to give up and quit. But he'd met Sanji again, and that... that was the best. "It could have been better. But I don't think I'd trade any of the bad moments for happier ones."

Sanji rolled his eyes. "Some bullshit about learning from it right?"

"What about you, then? Could last year have been better?"

"Of course it could've. I let myself be put into a position where I had to make one of the worst decisions of my life, but later on I made one of the best. And if I could go back in time and change that first decision, I would. I _pray_ that I could."

"There's no way to make something right but to fix it yourself," said Zoro. No use praying to some god that probably didn't exist. He knew just how futile that was.

"I am. I'm working on it." Sanji's fingers twitched against Zoro's hand, and for a second Zoro thought he was going to pull away, but he didn't.

"Working on what?"

"Let's just drop it. There's not a whole lot of use in talking about it. It's a new year, right? Better to make it happy." But in contrast to what he was saying, Sanji's head was tilted down, face shadowed by his hair, and the words were quiet, monotonous.

Zoro's instincts screamed for him to probe further, to figure out just what had brought Sanji's mood down so abruptly, but he didn't. That wasn't his right, and he didn't want to upset Sanji further, so he was silent.

A few minutes later, they came to a stop outside of a run-down, hole in the wall type bar. Sanji put out his cigarette, tossed it in a trash can, and they went inside.

It was noisy with music and people, mostly around their age and not college kids, but luckily it wasn't overly packed and the environment seemed alright, so they grabbed a table and ordered a round of beers - some kind of chocolate stout micro brew for Sanji and dark ale for Zoro, along with a basket of mozzarella sticks.

"So we're going to Luffy's fight, right?" Sanji asked, and took the first sip of his beer. He made a considering face, then nodded in approval. His bad mood seemed to have disappeared as quickly as it came on, and Zoro didn't know whether to be glad for it or disturbed because of it.

He cleared his throat, dropping both arms to the table to lean on them. "Yeah. I figured I can get an earlier shift that day, that way I'll be able to come."

"Alright. He usually comes by for lunch or dinner, so I'll just cook a little extra for you and we can meet at my apartment. We'll eat before we go."

"That works." Zoro took a bite of a steaming mozzarella stick and spent a few moments fanning his mouth to cool off.

"Great. Hey, listen," Sanji said. He paused to take a sip of his beer before going on. "So there's this big cooking thing that happens in Lyon around the end of January every couple years, and I think I'm gonna go this year. I'd be gone for a little under a week. Would you be okay with that?" he asked, nervously twitching his fingers around his glass. "Obviously I don't need your blessing for it but you won't get bored if I'm gone, right?"

The idea of a week without Sanji wasn't anything that killed him. After all, he'd gone a lot longer without him before. But at the same time, he just wanted to be with Sanji, any second he could get, no matter where he had to go. Tonight had evidenced that. He wanted to be near Sanji, and knowing that Sanji wanted to be near him too, it was enough for him to decide that yeah, he could stand a week without him, just so long as he came back to Zoro at the end of it. "Go. Don't let me hold you back."

Sanji smiled, relieved, and dug a mozzarella stick into the little cup of marinara sauce. "So Ace mentioned somebody was taking him out for his birthday. You think he finally got Smoker to give in?"

"Doubtful. Smoker hates being distracted with human interaction."

"I thought the same thing with you too at first, but look how it's turned out."

"That's a lot different," Zoro replied.

"I don't really see how."

And Zoro didn't really know how to tell Sanji just _why_ it was different. Because yeah, Zoro didn't often bother himself with people outside of his realm of friends, and when they'd met again, he and Sanji probably didn't count as anything but acquaintances anymore. But Sanji had stayed in his heart for so many years that he couldn't imagine just brushing him off. Even if he hadn't been in love, he wouldn't have treated Sanji coldly. It had just taken him a little while to get accustomed to who Sanji was now.

* * *

By the time they ended up leaving, they'd had plenty of beer and were pretty close to drunk. It was raining outside, and they both stood for a moment under the awning, shocked at the idea that it could possibly _do_ that.

Because they were fairly inebriated and not thinking that straight, Zoro grabbed Sanji by the hand and pulled him down the street through the rain rather than hailing for a taxi. They got turned around a few times before Sanji took the lead and got them to the subway station and onto the train headed for home, but by then they were soaked to the bone. Even as disgustingly cold and wet as they were, Sanji insisted on leaning against him the entire way, and somehow managed to fall into a standing nap.

It was only when they had pulled up to the DeKalb station that Zoro realized they'd gotten on the wrong train, and he shook Sanji awake telling him so.

"So? We'll just go to your place," Sanji said. His eyes were heavy lidded, and he looked ready to fall right back asleep.

When they pulled up at Zoro's stop, it was raining even harder. And yet again, they set off at a wild run, sprinting along streets with Sanji just barely in the lead.

"My pants are starting to fall!" Sanji called back, laughing. He was quite the pitiful sight with drenched hair hanging around his face, wet shirt and pants sticking to him, and waterlogged shoes flapping heavily on the ground.

"Pull them up! We're almost home!"

They had to dodge around a couple walking under an umbrella, but came back together just as they turned onto Zoro's street. Sanji pulled ahead of him in long strides, and made it up to the overhang of Zoro's front door half a block before Zoro did.

In the meantime, he'd unlocked the door and let himself inside, dripping all over the hardwood floor, and he was stripping out of his clothes when Zoro finally got in.

"Ugh. My cigarettes are all soggy," he said, glaring at the carton in disgust.

"Everything about you is soggy," Zoro replied. He led the way toward the laundry closet, struggling out of his wet coat as he went. "C'mon, I'll get this stuff in the dryer and we can go take a shower."

Sanji trailed behind him, tripping drunkenly over the leg of his jeans at one point, then stumbling into the wall, and Zoro didn't even bother to keep his laughter down. It was starting to become clear to him that Sanji was kind of a lightweight when it came to drinking. Or maybe he was just average and it seemed pitiful compared to Zoro's monstrous tolerance.

He loaded the clothes into the dryer, Sanji trying to help but just making it more awkward with the addition of another pair of thoroughly uncoordinated hands. Then he took a pitstop in the kitchen to grab an armful of water bottles out of the fridge, and finally, they made their way upstairs, Zoro turning lights on and off to help Sanji along. Inside the bedroom, he dropped his load of water on the nightstand.

But before they could get into the bathroom for a shower, Sanji tackled Zoro onto the bed. His head popped up as he settled on Zoro's hips and his playful smile shone in the dim light filtering in from the window.

"Hi."

"Hi," Zoro replied. Sanji's skin was covered in goosebumps, still slightly damp to the touch. He traced his fingers in ever decreasing circles over Sanji's stomach until he was shivering and trying to arch away.

"Guess what?" Sanji asked, slapping Zoro's hand until he'd stopped.

"What?"

"I wanna fuck you." The rough burr in his voice shot straight down to Zoro's groin.

"I guess that's doable," he said.

"C'mon. Up."

Zoro had no idea what Sanji was trying to get him to do, even with the little _go on_ motions he was making with his hands. Finally he scooted back towards the pillows and Sanji looked satisfied, crawling up the bed after him. Lube and a condom were gathered from the nightstand, and then Sanji knelt between Zoro's bent legs.

"Did you know," Sanji said, dribbling lube all over Zoro's thighs as he tried to coat his fingers, "that I've been wanting to do this to you for a while?"

"Why didn't you?" Zoro asked. He tucked his hands under his head and lifted his hips up a little to better accommodate Sanji.

"Honestly? I didn't think you'd let me." He finally seemed satisfied with the amount of lube on his fingers, pushing them together and pulling them apart so that it made a kind of faint _pop_ noise of viscous liquid separating each time. With no hesitation, he leaned down and started to push one finger into Zoro.

It was a bit of a rough burn at first, but it quickly settled, and he spread his thighs a little more. "I don't really do it this way often, but it's enjoyable."

"Not gonna try and pull the whole big and in control thing?"

"I don't really think taking it up the ass makes you not in control," Zoro replied. Sanji had gone straight for two fingers now, and was curling them as gently as he could manage.

"Nah, I know. You just always kind of have a certain image of people in your head... about them in bed, or whatever."

Zoro laughed, which cut out into a moan as Sanji's fingers brushed momentarily against his prostate. "You think about people's sex lives a lot?"

"Of course."

"Wanna tell me about them?"

Sanji was quiet and concentrated for a second as he worked his fingers in again. "Well, when I saw you at the restaurant, I thought that you'd be the kind of guy who's into super kinky shit-"

"Who says I'm not?" Zoro countered, more for argument's sake than from actual offense.

"I mean, you just look like the kind of guy who wants to tie people up and spank them with a paddle for an hour or two."

"Never done that one before."

"But you're pretty tame and gentle so far." Sanji rolled the condom on and slicked it with a palmful of lube, then positioned himself at Zoro's hole. "Ready?"

"Yeah."

Sanji pressed in, slow and smooth. His eyes closed for a few seconds, then opened again to gaze down at Zoro, his pupils dilated with lust. He took a few experimental thrusts in before setting up a rhythm. Zoro had to admire the way his whole body flexed as he worked into Zoro's body.

All pretense of conversation was dropped in favor of moving together. Sanji wasn't anything like Zoro thought he would be - honestly, he probably had more of a handle on fucking people than Zoro did, even taking into account how drunk he was. It wasn't that he was perfectly suave or that no movement was misplaced so much as that it all felt perfectly effortless, like something Sanji didn't even have to think about. He maintained perfect rhythm easily, and there was an almost dreamy, unconcerned look on his face as he thrust into Zoro, holding a point of contact with his left hand cupped around Zoro's knee, the other wrapped around his cock.

"Sorry, I'm still really drunk," Sanji laughingly apologized, though Zoro didn't see what he had to apologize for.

He shifted his hips a little, trying to angle Sanji's cock against his prostate, and let out a sighing moan when a frisson of pleasure skittered up into his belly. "You're fine."

It took them plenty of time and plenty of positions to finally get each other off. They were really too drunk and too old to have one of those frenzied, passionate fucks that seemed to last only a couple minutes, but this was good too. Probably better. Slow and intense, with plenty of time for kissing. It was almost overwhelming for Zoro, who couldn't recall ever feeling so thoroughly filled with pleasure when he was on the receiving end. And when they'd both come and slumped back into the pillows, completely wrung out and sweating, it felt worth it.

The first couple hours of the new year were, for them, full of the kind of good, content feelings that seemed to slip through the fingers too easily. It was the sort of feeling that this moment in time was just right, and it couldn't have happened with anyone else, anywhere else, and though there wasn't anything particularly special about it, Zoro just knew that it would stick out in his mind forever as a moment that was _perfect_.

He rolled over after several long minutes of laying there in complete satisfaction, and grabbed two of the water bottles he'd sat on the nightstand earlier. One of them was passed to Sanji, and he made sure the whole thing was empty before he gulped his own down. They bundled themselves into the comforter and fell asleep easily.

Eight and a half hours later, they struggled to release themselves from the clutches of the warm bed. It took a good half hour to stop dozing back off and pull themselves up, but they finally showered and headed downstairs for a breakfast of toast and jam with an egg apiece.

"You really need to actually go grocery shopping once in a while," Sanji said sleepily. There wasn't any coffee in the cabinets anymore, so Sanji wasn't feeling all that pleased about life what with the loss of that on top of his cigarettes.

Zoro shrugged. "I'm always either at work or your place these days."

"Yeah, but what about when I come over? There's never anything but what I bring."

"Shopping is for suckers."

Sanji made as offended a face as he possibly could when he was still half asleep and possibly unaware that he looked more like a disgruntled kitten than anything else. "I shop all the time."

"And you're a sucker, aren't you?"

"You seem to be under the impression that the only thing a sucker does is shop. And I happen to know that there are also suckers who look, act, and talk exactly like you, possible even _are_ you."

Zoro was highly amused at how completely out of it Sanji sounded, but tried (and failed) not to show it. At least Sanji was too sleepy to realize that Zoro was laughing at him. "Is that right."

"Yeah. Let's go to the store after this."

"No fucking way."

"What? Why not?" Sanji asked. A chunk of egg dropped off his fork and into his lap, but he seemed completely oblivious to that fact.

"You think I'd willingly spend two hours in the store while you choose between things that are exactly the same?" Zoro took a sip of his tea - pomegranate green, this morning - and polished off the last of his toast. His stomach grumbled, completely unsatisfied with these meagre offerings.

"It's important to choose the best quality ingredients," Sanji said belligerently.

"Maybe for you. I don't give a fuck as long as I can eat it."

"Fine. You can have spaghetti-o's for the rest of the week, see if I care."

Zoro laughed and reached over to pinch Sanji in the side until he let out a squawk and jumped away, nearly falling off the bar stool.

"I think you're actually worse sober and without coffee than you are when you're drunk," Zoro said.

"Shut up. I'm going to walk to Starbucks."

"Starbucks? What have you done with Sanji?"

"Listen. I am _really_ desperate right now. If I don't get caffeine in my system soon I'll probably melt."

"What are you, the Wicked Witch?" Zoro asked, amused.

"Yes. I'm going now. I'll come back when I'm alive." And Zoro could do nothing but watch as Sanji hopped down from the stool and headed for the front door.

"Hey," Zoro said, forcing down laughter. "Forgetting something?"

"Oh. My wallet."

"Uh, no, I was thinking more toward the concept of wearing pants."

Sanji hummed to himself as he looked down at his bare, hairy legs. "I guess that could be important."

"Okay. You stay here, _I'll_ go to Starbucks and get you something," Zoro said. He made his way toward the laundry alcove and got his jeans and sweater from last night out of the dryer, pulling them on quickly. His shoes were sitting on the rug nearby, in front of the heater, and he tugged them on too. In the kitchen, he pocketed his wallet, and Sanji turned his head to look at him.

"Caramel macchiato with whole milk, venti," he mumbled. Zoro honestly thought he was going to drop off into sleep any second now.

"Alright. Back in a few."

Of course the line in the Starbucks down the block was fucking ridiculous as usual, so it took him ten minutes after getting there to even order, and another five as he waited for the drink. But finally, it was in his hand, and he pushed back out onto the sidewalk, only to bump into Lieutenant Hina. She was looking somewhat haggard, eyes hidden by sunglasses and a cigarette hanging out of her mouth, ash crawling nearly up to the filter.

"Oh. Hello Detective," she said after a second of staring at him. "How are you?"

"Uh. Fine," he muttered. Hina was typically respectful, if not a little bit cold at times, and kind of spacey. But he didn't know her particularly well - she wasn't _his_ Lieutenant - and it felt weird to be approached by her. He was slightly caught off his guard.

"That's good... Is your case progressing well?"

"... It's fine."

"Good... It's good that someone is finally trying to pull Absalom off the streets."

"Absalom?" Zoro asked, confused.

"Mm," Hina hummed, pulling in a drag on her cigarette. It didn't seem like she intended to elaborate, so Zoro went ahead and prompted her further.

"Who the hell is Absalom?"

"You know... The man who assaulted that woman a couple weeks ago. I heard the fire department found evidence of him being near the arson site too."

_What the fuck_ , Zoro thought. Why the hell did she know all this shit, and why the hell didn't _he_ , or Smoker for that matter? "Where did you find all this out from?"

"I've dealt with him a couple times on misdemeanors, but everybody knows what kind of person he is. He'd have to be like that, considering he's one of the Shadowcutter's guys," said Hina, casually as you please, as if there weren't people walking past or standing against the wall nearby who were perfectly capable of listening in.

"Uh, okay. Listen, I have to get back home," he said, waving the cup around slightly in evidence. "It was nice seeing you, though."

"Of course. Hina didn't mean to keep you," she said.

Zoro turned away, suddenly full of the need to figure out as much as he could about this Absalom guy, and rushed back home where sure enough, Sanji seemed to be passed out over the bar. He placed the cup on the counter and watched as Sanji took in a breath, eyes fluttering open, and lifted his head, hands going straight for the cup.

Sanji didn't even pay him any mind, just started to chug the hot liquid, so Zoro wandered into the living room to get his laptop out and start doing some research until Sanji had come back to life.

It didn't take long for him to wander into the living room and sit down on the couch beside Zoro with a notepad, but he still looked bleary-eyed and squinty. "What are you doing?" he asked curiously, eyes narrowed at the laptop screen.

"Research. Are you wearing your contacts?"

"No. I didn't have my case with me last night so I can't wear them until I get them in some solution."

"Are you gonna be okay to get home without them?"

"Uh, yeah? I should be. It's not like I suddenly become blind when I'm not wearing them," Sanji said, looking down at the pad of paper in his lap. He was quiet for a few seconds, and his cheeks flushed when he spoke again. "I'm gonna make you a list of things you need to get at the store, but... you're going to have to write them down for me."

Zoro cackled as he turned away from his laptop, figuring it was okay to be distracted for the time being. "Thought you said you weren't blind?"

"I'm not! I can see you just fine!" Sanji protested.

"But you can't see the laptop and you can't see the paper to write," Zoro said with a faint smile on his face.

"Fine, I'll do it _myself_." And Sanji immediately propped the notepad on his knee, holding it hardly an inch from his eye, and began to write.

Zoro rolled his eyes, knowing it was useless now that Sanji's pride was wounded, and got back to crawling through databases. Sure enough there was only one Absalom in the city's police records, and he was described as often wearing a lion's mask of all things when he was committing crimes, so that lined up with the witness testimony of the assaulter wearing an animal mask. To him, it was enough to connect the guy on his laptop screen and the guy who'd committed that assault a couple weeks ago, but he read on just in case.

Ten minutes later, Sanji finished his list, and he was now squinting at his phone. "Shit. I have to get home," he muttered, standing from the couch and heading for the hall.

"What's wrong?" Zoro asked.

"One of the guys from work is sitting outside my apartment right now needing somewhere to stay for the night. Fighting with his girlfriend again, I guess," said Sanji from the hallway. There was the clang of the dryer opening, and the sound of fabric shifting over skin, then Sanji came back into the living room.

He came straight for Zoro, placing his hands on the back of the sofa at either side of Zoro's head, and bent down to kiss him a couple times. "I like you," he whispered, nuzzling his scratchy cheek against Zoro's.

"I like you too," Zoro replied with a soft tug of his hand through Sanji's hair. "Thanks for staying over last night."

"Thanks for humoring me last night," Sanji said, cheeks flushing up a little. "And this morning."

"No problem. I've never actually gone to see the ball drop in person, so it was kind of interesting."

"Admit it. You liked it because I was there with you," Sanji said, a pleased, secretive smile on his face.

"No, it was definitely being surrounded by people and loud noises," Zoro said, sarcasm weighing heavy in his voice.

Sanji smiled and placed one last kiss on Zoro's mouth before he withdrew. "I'll text you later."

"Yeah, be careful. Try not to fall off the subway platform or anything."

"Shut up bastard! I can see just fine!"

* * *

"Apparently the Joker's group is raising its head again," Tashigi said. She nudged her glasses up and rubbed her temples tiredly.

"Them and everyone else," Zoro replied. They had been sitting together in his office for a couple hours now, going through everything they could find out about Absalom. Then, when they'd exhausted that, absolutely convinced that he was their suspect, they filled out an affidavit for a warrant, and finally, they'd progressed on to talking about stolen evidence.

It was obvious that both the arson tapes being stolen and the break-in at Tashigi's were in conjunction with the crimes, but what they needed to know was exactly _who_ it was now benefitting: the perpetrating gangs, attempting to intercept their investigations? Or a rival gang, trying to get blackmail material?

"We need to be keeping an eye out though..." said Tashigi, bringing him back to the present. "If he thinks they're being pushed into obscurity, he'll try to reassert his name and dominance."

"Yeah. Chief Garp's in contact with the hospitals. The moment any of them find patients with unknown drugs in their systems, we'll know."

If it was possible, Tashigi was often more tightly wound about wanting to protect people than Zoro was. It was useless to tell her not to worry because that was just what she _did_ , and in a way it kind of pleased him that she did. He liked to know there were people here besides him that gave a shit.

"As glad as I am to hear that, I'd much rather we catch it ahead of time. Keep people from getting a hold of those drugs... Something."

"Two people can't stage a drug bust," Zoro said with a shrug. "And anyway, it's not like we know where the hell they are now."

"Yeah... I know that all we can do is wait, but that's such a bullshit excuse to me," she muttered.

"I know, and _you_ know that I feel the same." He drained half of his water bottle before setting it back down. His desk was covered in scraps of paper from legal pads containing each and every bit of pertinent information they'd gathered over the course of the day. There was barely a single space to put things down; they'd even had to drag a side table over from the corner of the room just so they could eat lunch on a flat surface.

"Of course! There's just this sinking feeling of dread every time we have to hold out for something to happen. And it's even _worse_ knowing that in the end, they're just going to slip through our fingers anyway. It's like... two steps forward, one step back."

Zoro sympathized. It wasn't like he'd actually managed to make any decent progress in these past couple years either. Just an endless chain of dreading reports about families being attacked in their own homes, or teenagers dying of horrible overdoses, or arsons. An endless chain of receiving the call, having to deal with it, having to see every miniscule detail of it, and come up saying _no, there's nothing here that we can connect to anything larger_. It was stressful. He'd never questioned his choices in life more than he had over the recent years.

That wasn't to say they had stagnated completely - they'd arrested individual culprits, presumably gang members taking the fall for the big guys; they'd destroyed drug caches; they'd located and wiped out weapons suppliers. But killing a couple wasps doesn't eliminate the colony.

* * *

It wasn't until Sunday that Smoker came back to work. Out of all of them, he was on the job most often, but he was just as liable to enjoy his time off. And Zoro wasn't keen to interrupt that by calling him about work matters when he wasn't on the job.

He was sitting in Smoker's office, waiting as Smoker puffed on a cigar and pecked at his keyboard while taking a call from one of the other stations at the same time. The conversation droned on and on, and eventually Zoro conked the hell out, not awakening until the phone receiver was slammed down.

"Morning, buttercup. Tell me what you and Tashigi came up with while I was out," said Smoker, releasing a massive cloud of smoke.

Zoro yawned. "Hina gave me some leads on the assault case. Some guy named Absalom. We put in a request for a warrant, so now we're just waiting for that to go through. And we talked a little bit about the Joker."

"That shit again? Just 'cause you hear it doesn't mean it's gonna happen. We don't know that anybody's actually gonna resurface."

"Yeah, but we don't exactly have a whole lot of passive gangs on our hands."

"Well Big Mom and the Beast are liable to make moves at any moment, but Whitebeard and Red Hair are more likely to bide their time. They won't come out unless they're provoked."

"If even one of them gets involved, it'll be complete chaos," said Zoro. "I think we're just lucky that it's been the smaller groups the new guys are going after. But that doesn't mean we won't see the big ones come out of the woodwork soon."

"Alright, say the Joker and the Shadowcutter are at it again. What the hell do you propose we do about it at this point? You wanna go looking for them like you did with Hawkeyes? Wanna pick a one-man fight with them and get yourself nearly killed again?"

Zoro went silent, cowed.

"Hawkeyes is about as likely to be provoked as Whitebeard and Red Hair are, so's the Pacifista. The Knight's practically off the map at this point. Baroque Works could move at any moment, but they're more likely to infiltrate from the inside out, so I doubt we'd see any civilian violence from them. The Snake Princess is a wild card... the second they do anything to piss her off, she'll go to war without thinkin'. So all told, everything's pretty safe for the time being."

"You forgot the Revolutionary," Zoro said.

Smoker leaned back in his chair and let out a loud sigh. "You shouldn't even have to ask. You know he's about at any moment. Of everybody, we can be a hundred percent sure he'll make a move. The only question is when."

* * *

It seemed like Zoro and Sanji wouldn't be seeing each other until Luffy's fight, once you factored in how busy and tiresome both of their jobs currently were. Zoro hadn't gotten a day off in more than a week, and it was beginning to be disruptive to his sleeping schedule. Even when he was drop-dead tired, he couldn't manage to fall asleep for long enough to feel rested.

He came home from work on Friday, yawning and exhausted. The night before, he hadn't even been able to fall asleep at all. At first he'd blamed it on the especially noisy people who were out in the streets past midnight, but he finally gave in around three in the morning and got up to be productive.

Or at least he'd intended to. He'd gone downstairs to put a load of laundry in the washer, then ended up back in bed, reading until it was time to get ready for work, and then he'd slogged through the day feeling groggy and unalert.

It was a struggle to even unlock the front door once he was home. He could think about nothing more than walking up the stairs and climbing straight into bed, and that's where his feet started to carry him, practically on autopilot. But then he pulled to a stop in the doorway of his bedroom, unsure if he was having some kind of sleep-deprived hallucination.

Sanji was bare-chested, sheets pulled up into a pool at his lap, and he was reading quietly. His glasses were perched on his nose, and his hair was still slightly damp from a shower. He glanced up at Zoro, smiling. "Hey."

It was possible that the sight of Sanji was even better than the sight of his bed, but his vision blurred over abruptly and he knew that the bed was what he _really_ needed right now. He stepped inside and began to unbutton his shirt with clumsy fingers, then shrugged out of it and let it fall to the floor. "Hey. Didn't know you would be here."

"Aw, did I ruin your plans? Were you gonna bring your other lover over?" Sanji asked. His sweet smile had turned wicked.

"Yeah, that's exactly it," Zoro said. He barely had the energy to inject the statement with sarcasm.

"What's up?" Sanji asked, teasing attitude making way for concern.

"Just tired. I didn't sleep last night."

Sanji's eyebrows pinched together. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah. Just too fucking busy at work."

A dubious look crossed Sanji's face but he didn't question it. "Okay. Do you want me to heat up some dinner for you?" he asked instead, closing his book and putting it on the nightstand.

"I don't need to eat. I just need to sleep," Zoro sighed. He sat down on the edge of the bed and pulled off his shoes, then slid out of his pants and got under the sheets. The last thing he felt before drifting off was Sanji's fingertips stroking soothingly through the choppy spikes of his hair.

Of course Sanji was gone when Zoro awoke nearly fourteen hour later, but even absent as he was, his effect on Zoro lingered. Just seeing him for a couple minutes had been enough to normalize his mood from the irritable thing it had morphed into over the week.

He regretted being asleep the whole time though, especially knowing that he really only had two more weeks with Sanji before he left for France. It was going to be hard and unsatisfying, knowing that he couldn't spend every moment with Sanji that he wanted to between now and then. But he knew he could push through it, because Sanji would come back. He'd always come back.


	8. Combat Baby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the kudos and bookmarks, you guys are great! I just really quickly want to warn for brief mention of suicide in this chapter.

More and more, Zoro had begun to realize that Sanji was his escape from work. It wasn't that he hated his job; it was just something that weighed constantly and oppressively on his mind. Sanji seemed to relieve some of that, with the inane texts he sent over the course of the work day that never failed to make Zoro smile, and with the short phone calls they always managed to work in each day, no matter what.

Sanji forced him to keep equilibrium, making his focus turn and reorient itself. There were things he still enjoyed. He didn't have to make himself worry every second about all these gangs coming back, getting innocent people killed, making people _hurt_. There were _good_ things that he could think about. And the _best_ thing to think about was Sanji. Not just sex or his body or his touch, but his laugh, the way his face lit up just a little when Zoro walked into the room, the way he didn't take any of Zoro's shit, and of course, his _cooking_. Zoro didn't feel entirely bad in admitting that his main motivation for making it through the rest of the week was getting to eat Sanji's cooking over the weekend.

So when it was time to leave on Friday, he didn't linger around the office. There was no getting sucked into conversations with Tashigi and Smoker for him, or pausing to say goodbye to every single person who said goodbye to him (not that he ever did that anyway). No, he made sure he had his things, locked his office door, and he was fucking _out_ of there, headed straight for Sanji's with only a stop at home to take a quick shower and change into a pair of jeans and a hoodie.

He let himself into the apartment an hour later, following the sound of Sanji's whistling into the kitchen. And there Sanji was, already dressed but barefooted, shredding chicken into a pot. He glanced up for a second, glasses sliding down his nose, and smiled at Zoro. "Hey. You're here early."

Zoro crossed the kitchen in a couple strides, wrapped his arms around Sanji's waist from behind, and deposited a kiss on the back of his neck. "I was hungry."

"It's so nice to only be liked for your cooking skills," said Sanji, though amusement was clear in his voice.

"Nah. You're alright too," Zoro said. He tucked his nose into the crook of Sanji's neck, breathing in the scent of him. It made him relax almost immediately.

"Of course you'd say that. You're obligated to." Sanji had now finished with the chicken breast in his hands and started pulling apart another. "Hey, push my glasses up for me."

Zoro made a face, but reached around to push them back up Sanji's nose. "What are you making?" he asked after a minute or so of silence.

"Chicken barbecue. Luffy likes it and it's simple, so that makes it easy on me."

"Seems like it takes forever," said Zoro. At this point, Sanji was only halfway through the second breast, and he had two more sitting on a chopping board waiting to be ripped apart. Zoro didn't know if he could actually wait for Sanji to finish; he was hungry _now_.

"I would have done it this morning, I just didn't have time to take care of it before work. Stop complaining, it'll be ready soon."

Zoro relented, deciding instead to distract himself with scraping his teeth over the junction of Sanji's neck and shoulder until he let out a small groan, head tipping to the side. That seemed like encouragement enough, and Zoro practically latched on, sucking hard at the pale skin there until it was thrumming with Sanji's pulse.

"Do you mind?" Sanji asked, his voice strained. Zoro looked down to see that he'd dropped half of the breast into the pot of already-shredded chicken, and his hands were tightly clutching the edge of the counter.

"Not at all," Zoro murmured against Sanji's skin, placing a careful kiss over the bruise that was forming on his neck.

"You seriously can't just wait until I'm done?"

"No. You're taking forever." Zoro was fully aware that he sounded like a petulant child.

"Shut _up_ ," Sanji replied, nudging his elbow into Zoro's stomach as he tossed a piece of fat into the trash and got back to shredding, though he did tear off a chunk and hand it to Zoro, who ate it whole.

"Are you done yet?" Zoro asked after he'd swallowed.

"No."

"When are you going to be done?"

"When I'm _done_ ," said Sanji, his bare foot kicking Zoro in the ankle. "Go somewhere else if you're just going to whine."

Zoro didn't, but he stopped bothering Sanji anyway, instead searching through the fridge for anything good to eat. He came up with some leftover bacon, two pickles, and a handful of fresh snap peas, which he consumed at a more sedate pace while Sanji moved onto the third chicken breast.

"So I bought my plane tickets," Sanji said after a while.

"Hm."

"You sure you don't mind me going?"

"I'm sure," Zoro said, voice full of conviction, even though his thoughts in that moment were that he didn't want to be apart from Sanji, didn't want to spend the whole week worrying. "I want you to have a good time."

"What if... do you want to come?" Sanji asked suddenly.

Zoro took a second to think. He could imagine how amazing a week in France with Sanji would be, but... "I have to be here."

"Of course," said Sanji, and Zoro could have sworn that he sounded almost disappointed. "Work to do. City to keep safe and all that."

Zoro crossed the kitchen to wrap his arms around Sanji's waist once again, dropping a kiss on his cheek. "I want to though."

Sanji's fingers stumbled a little as he began to shred the last chunk. "It'd be really nice."

"Yeah."

"No use in talking about it though," said Sanji, dropping the last of the meat into the pot, then dumping in the contents of a bottle of barbecue sauce. He shook Zoro off and moved over to put the pot on the burner. "It's fine. Maybe some other time."

"Yeah."

"How was your day, anyway?" Sanji asked, stirring the mixture together over heat.

"Eh. Nami's mom came down to the station to see Smoker, which was interesting. Other than that, pretty quiet."

"Yeah? I've never even met her before, come to think of it."

"She's a good woman. Her and Smoker both have pretty similar auras, actually, except she's a huge troublemaker," Zoro said. "Acts younger than her kids."

Sanji laughed. "Not everybody can be as much of a grandpa as you are."

"I'm not a _grandpa_."

"Yeah, except for the part where you used to wear that thing around your stomach when you were a kid! I asked Koshiro once and he told me it was something old people wear to increase blood flow or keep their bellies warm in Japan. You're always taking naps, too."

"And that makes me an old man?"

"It sure does."

"Does that make you a grave-robber then?" Zoro wondered.

"It makes me charitable as hell to give an old man like you a chance," Sanji said. From the side, Zoro watched his lips curl up into a smirk.

In a split second, Zoro leapt, shoving his fingers under Sanji's shirt to tickle his stomach.

"I'm gonna _kill_ you," Sanji huffed out through laughter as he tried to squirm away and tend to the pot at the same time, with little success.

"Not until you apologize for calling me an old man," Zoro replied. He kept his face perfectly straight, and lightened the movements of his fingers even more until Sanji was wheezing.

A timely knock on the door interrupted them, and Sanji took Zoro's momentary lapse to squirm away and grab the closest object to himself, which turned out to be a wire whisk and not actually anything deadly. "Go get that!" he yelled, brandishing the utensil as if it were a baseball bat.

Zoro grinned, ready to pounce again, but Sanji had seemed to gain his bearings and now he aimed a kick straight at Zoro's face. At the last moment, Zoro stepped back and retreated for the front door.

When he opened it, Luffy was stood there in a long gaudy fur coat. "Hi Zoro!" he hollered, though they were standing right in front of each other.

"Hey Luffy." He weathered the storm of limbs that wrapped around him, then carried Luffy into the kitchen when it seemed he wasn't going to let go, depositing him safely on the floor.

"Saaanji! Food!"

"Not even a hello?" Sanji asked, laughing darkly as he held up the whisk once again, which caused Luffy to look very confused. "Rude people don't get dinner in this kitchen."

"Hi Sanji! Hi food!" He tried to reach into the pot to grab some of the chicken, but Sanji smacked his hand hard with the whisk, leaving behind several thin red lines.

"It'll be done in five minutes. You can wait until then."

Luffy pushed his lips out in a pout, but Sanji ignored him, pointedly staring down at the chicken as he stirred it. Personally, Zoro suspected he kept going longer than was actually necessary just to punish the both of them, but he pulled it off the heat and dished it up before Luffy could really get going on how hungry he was.

They ate at the bar instead of in the dining room since it was only the three of them. Luffy was ravenous, gulping his three sandwiches down like he hadn't eaten in days, pausing only to drink the glass of sweet tea that Sanji had supplied him with. Then he ate an entire tub of potato salad, had a second glass of sweet tea, and managed to locate and destroy Sanji's secret stash of chocolate-covered peanuts.

Finally, he leaned back and let out a loud belch, patting his belly contentedly. "Thanks, Sanji!"

"Eating me out of house and _home_ ," Sanji muttered faintly as he stared at the destruction of his kitchen. "Used only for my _cooking skills_."

"Ah, well, I'd better get out of here," Luffy said without batting an eye. "Nami made me promise not to be late."

"Sure. Good luck tonight," Sanji said, apparently abandoning his self-pity.

"I don't need luck!" Luffy announced. "I'm strong, and I have things to fight for!"

"Yeah, of course." Sanji nodded sincerely, and they showed him out with a couple of manly hugs first, with plenty of back-slapping for Luffy.

"See ya!" Luffy called as he headed into the elevator, his long coat swishing and nearly catching between the doors as they closed. Zoro chuckled at him, and Sanji smiled, and they shook their heads at each other.

Back inside the apartment, they set to cleaning up the decimated plates of crumbs and dribbles of barbecue sauce from dinner, wiping away the remains of potato salad at Luffy's seat and loading everything into the dishwasher. There were no leftovers, though, so that was one less thing to worry about.

"Does he get in and out that quickly every time?" Zoro asked. Luffy had probably only been there for a total of fifteen minutes, and even that was stretching it.

"Basically. I feed him before every match. He says my cooking makes him stronger." Sanji sounded dubious, but Zoro could tell that he was pleased by the idea of his cooking being so invigorating. "But that's basically all he comes over here for on match days."

"Hm."

"I wonder how you're going to survive without me for a whole week," Sanji wondered suddenly, drying his hands on a dish towel.

"I don't need you _that_ badly."

"I mean, how are you going to _feed_ yourself?"

"Do you just assume I didn't do anything at all before you came along?" Zoro asked, equal parts offended and amused.

"Basically, yeah." He shot Zoro a smirk as he brushed past him into the living room, and so Zoro followed him out on the balcony, watching Sanji as he put a cigarette in his mouth, lighting it quickly. It was one of those unseasonably cool (not warm, but cool) nights, so the lack of a coat wasn't too awful for either of them.

Sanji leaned his elbows on the balcony railing as he smoked, and Zoro took a moment to look at him from behind. Even from here he was attractive; every single pair of pants he owned seemed to fit perfectly to his body, and that was distracting enough, but it was more the figure he presented. For someone so skinny, he had one of the biggest, most intimidating presences Zoro had ever encountered. That was his usual type - people as intimidating as him, people as _passionate_ as him.

Sanji had only fit into _one_ of those categories when they were younger; he was incredibly dedicated to cooking, but he was shrimpy, whiny, and nobody took a second glance at him. Nobody except for Zoro. But he knew now that, skinny as Sanji was, he could genuinely knock the hell out of someone in a fight, and that was something Zoro kind of _adored_ about him.

"What's with that look, bastard?" Sanji asked. He'd turned around, back against the railing, and was looking at Zoro with eyes full of laughter, lips pursed as he tried not to smile.

Zoro stepped forward between his legs, pressing their chests together, his hands coming down to curl around Sanji's hips. "Nothing. Just thinking about you," he said before pressing a few quick kisses against Sanji's mouth.

Sanji's hands came up to rest on Zoro's biceps, fingers squeezing lightly. "Hm. What about me?"

"Sometimes I just find it hard to believe that we're here together."

"If you really think about it, it was kind of inevitable." Sanji said. His eyes had caught on Zoro's lips for a few moments, but now they drifted up to look him in the eye, and they were utterly serious.

Zoro hummed. He didn't know about _inevitable_ , but maybe Sanji saw a different side of it.

* * *

Madison Square Garden was packed with people. There was the low-level drone of thousands of voices talking at the same time, and they'd had to edge around huge throngs of very enthusiastic boxing fans to get to their row, but they were settled now, and Zoro glanced around as he always did in a new space - pinpointing exits, orienting himself as close as possible to the nearest one (not to cut and run if he had to, but to be better able to protect if he had to).

Despite watching nearly all of Luffy's fights on TV, it was different to actually _be_ here, and much bigger than he'd imagined. There were full-length banners overhead showing the night's contenders - Luffy, of course, and a man with a wide, square jaw, a hooked nose, and hair that seemed to stand in two individual tufts - Foxy. And though the arena hadn't completely filled up yet, there were tons of people waving around their own banners and signs. He was pleased to see that an overwhelming amount of them were here for Luffy.

"Didn't know we were going to be this close to the ring," he said to Sanji at last.

Sanji placed his hand over Zoro's on the railing, his fingers warm and dry. "They're his complimentary tickets. He always gives them to his friends."

That made sense; Luffy had offered tickets to Zoro countless times before, but he'd always had obligations at work that he couldn't get out of. Now he wished he'd tried harder to make it, because the energy in this room was incredible, and he kind of _liked_ being a part of it, even though it hadn't yet started.

They idled around while the place continued to fill up. Franky arrived about five minutes later, along with Chopper and Brook, and another five minutes after that, Nami came up from the hallways underneath the arena and joined them.

Chopper had slid into place beside Sanji and smiled widely at both he and Zoro, who couldn't help but to laugh a little. The kid looked so out of place in a room full of boxing fans in his doctor's coat, complete with a stethoscope hanging around his neck. "You came!" Chopper called over the din of people.

Zoro nodded, reaching over to pat him affectionately on the shoulder.

"Did you just get off work?" Sanji asked, his voice also louder to accommodate for the noise.

"Yeah! Law said he'd take over the last of my shift since I covered Christmas Eve for him," Chopper yelled back.

"Least he could-" Sanji started grouchily, but the announcer suddenly boomed around the room and people started yelling even louder, so much that Zoro couldn't even hear what the announcer was saying.

It was easy enough to guess, though. Luffy and Foxy were being paraded out, taking to the ring where they began to throw practice jabs at the air. Foxy was easily a good six inches shorter than Luffy, barrel-chested but weak of legs. Zoro wondered if all his strength lay in his upper body rather than his lower, and knew that would be a critical failing against Luffy if it were the case.

After a few moments, the ref drew them in and spoke to them hurriedly before stepping back. Then the bell rang, and they were off.

They circled, bobbing and weaving, until Luffy suddenly shot forward, throwing the first punch. It was tight and perfect, packed full of teeth-gritting power, and it pounded hard into Foxy's square jaw but didn't down him.

They traded blows for the next few minutes, landing a couple of hard hits each. It was apparent that they were both getting warmed up though, and the bell rang signalling the end of the first round with no knockdowns.

The second ended similarly, and it wasn't until the third that things started to get tense. So far, Luffy had shown no signs of weakening or slowing, sharp and focused as he countered and jabbed. And then Foxy got a punch in against his temple, drawing blood.

Instantly, Luffy began to move as if the air were solid, never quite able to contact with Foxy. It was frustrating to see him struggling, and when Zoro glanced over at his friends, everyone looked just as disgruntled as he probably did.

He turned back to the fight and saw the problem suddenly. The blow had shaken Luffy - his legs were quaking, unsteady, arms were fighting to stay in position. He was unable to move as quickly because he was wavering, and it had effectively halved his agility.

Foxy was saying something to Luffy. Taunting, if the twisted smile on his face was any indicator. He'd apparently made the wrong decision in doing so, because Luffy's face hardened, eyes narrowing, and he raised his fists up, locking them in place.

But even though he seemed spiritually reaffirmed, he still moved slowly. The bell rang, marking the end of the third round, and they went back to their corners.

Saul, Luffy's manager, lumbered over and slung a towel around Luffy's neck, handed him a bottle of water, then dabbed up the blood that had streamed down from his temple. The referee came over as well, checking to make sure that Luffy was alright to continue the fight, with the end result of a thumbs up.

By the time the bell rang for the start of the fourth round, Luffy was no longer shaking. He stood tall and stone-faced, taking no shit as Foxy tried to circle him.

He darted out, quick as a bullet, and gave Foxy a hard right to the chest, following it up with a left hook to the jaw. Foxy seemed to ring in place, body shaking, and Zoro even joined in with the crowd's noise of happiness when Foxy dropped to the floor.

The ref started the count, but only got a couple seconds in before he was back up, stepping close and clinching Luffy tightly in his hold. No matter how Luffy struggled, he couldn't get free, and the crowd made an uproarious noise of anger until the ref stepped in and broke them apart.

Of course, it had done its intended job of wasting time, and the bell rang, sending them to their opposite corners.

Sanji leaned in close to speak in Zoro's ear, pulling him away from the intense tunnel vision he'd affected throughout the course of the fight. "He's just trying to draw it out. He thinks if he can get in another hit like that first one, he can bring Luffy down."

Zoro nodded, eyes narrowed as he watched Foxy chattering arrogantly with his manager. "He'll be lucky if he can land anything after this. Luffy's pissed."

And a pissed Luffy was a Luffy who became too stubborn to back down. Even when he was hurt and his body should have given out, he'd stay on his feet. There was a reason he had no losses.

The bell rang. They were in against each other almost immediately, and though Luffy typically didn't guard very tightly, he kept his fists up to his chin until he saw an opening. The punch seemed to soar through the air in slow motion, his glove clenched perfectly as it connected against Foxy's nose. Blood streamed down, and even from a distance, Foxy's face was clearly contorted in shock.

For two minutes, Luffy pummeled him. He went down more than once, and the only thing that saved him from a third knockdown was the bell ringing.

Zoro realized that adrenaline was tearing through his own body, though it wasn't his fight. Standing here, seeing it in person, felt nothing like watching it on TV did. He could feel every imperceptible shift of mood in the match, could feel the waves of energy and intimidation rolling off of Luffy as he bore down on Foxy. Zoro's limbs felt electric, body awake and alive, ready to move, ready to _fight_. And Sanji seemed to feel the same, shifting from foot to foot restlessly beside Zoro.

The sixth round started, and Luffy was out for blood. He was obviously done playing around, and wanted to end the fight. It didn't even take a minute before Foxy was laid out, Luffy having taken the first opening he saw to slam his fist into Foxy's temple. When he went down this time, he stayed down, and the ten count was reached with the referee pointing to Luffy as the winner.

Luffy stepped back, arms raised in victory, and the arena was filled with the sounds of screaming and cheering. At the far end of the row, Chopper, Brook, and Franky were jumping all over each other and screeching about how cool Luffy was, and to Zoro's side, Sanji looked wholly satisfied, beaming happily. Nami was clearly pleased as well, though Zoro assumed that was a combination of Luffy's victory and all the bets she'd be collecting on because of it.

Zoro looked around himself at all the people who were crying or smiling or laughing, or all at once. It was sometimes strange to think that Luffy affected so many lives just because he was following his dream, but it was also kind of humbling.

He paused in his scanning of the crowds, eyes turned up into the stands. A little way behind them was a woman with long black hair, richly dressed in a purple qipao and a white cape covering her bare shoulders. She was so familiar that Zoro quickly became angry at himself for being unable to place her, because he could have _sworn_ that he knew her from somewhere.

"She's Luffy's super fan!" Franky said, noticing where Zoro's gaze was. "So don't get any ideas!"

"Do you know her name?" Zoro asked, groping for any way to identify her.

"No. But she shows up at all of Luffy's matches. Some kind of socialite, I think," Sanji pitched in from his side.

"I think I know her," Zoro said. He wished he could just place her face, because he knew he'd seen her somewhere before, and he knew it was related in some way to work, but beyond that, she rang no bells.

She finally noticed she was being watched by them, and returned their gazes haughtily, frowning disgustedly at them.

Zoro stared a second longer, then turned back to the ring, and by then both Luffy and Foxy had been carted off. Nami was grabbing her bag and making plans for them to all go down and see Luffy, and everyone was focused on her for the moment. Zoro wondered if he could slip away for just long enough to go up and speak to that woman.

But when he looked again, she was gone, and he couldn't locate her no matter where he looked. Everyone was leaving the row without him, so he hurried after them. Anybody could get lost in a place like this, and he definitely didn't want to risk it.

They made their way to Luffy's room, where Nami knocked softly at the door. The bodyguards standing watch there kept their eyes straight forward, not making any move to stop her, and a moment later, Saul opened the door, draped in towels and with water bottles in each hand. He stood back, letting them pass with a smile.

Inside, Luffy was laid out on a bench, drenched with sweat, blood dried on his forehead and cheek. All the same, there was a wide grin on his face, and it became even wider when he saw them. "You guys! Did you see how awesome I was?"

"You were super!" Franky said, and Brook and Chopper chimed in with their agreement.

Nami sat down beside Luffy's head and stroked his hair back, getting a good look at the cut on his temple, while Chopper came over and began to grill him about any pain. After he pronounced Luffy as uninjured as he could be after a fight like that, Franky and Brook finally crowded around him, diving down for hugs even as Nami shouted at them not to disturb him too much.

Zoro and Sanji stood at the back of the room, neither of them particularly interested in climbing all over Luffy. The adrenaline hadn't yet faded out of them, so they both still felt tense and jittery. And Zoro knew from experience that it wouldn't leave him until he'd completely worn himself out, which meant he should go home and put himself through his paces, but he realized that he wanted to ask Luffy something first.

He moved forward, pushing past Brook and Franky. "Luffy... There's a woman, black hair and a cape; Sanji said she comes to see your matches all the time. Who is she?"

"Oh," Luffy said, turning his smile upon Zoro. "That's Hammock!"

No matter how much he thought about it, the name meant nothing to Zoro. "What does she do?"

"What does that mean?" Luffy wondered. He was busy trying to sit up, but Chopper kept pushing him back down. "I don't know. She just shows up and watches. Then she leaves. She talked to me once, but she just wouldn't spit out whatever she was trying to say!"

"So you don't know anything about her?"

"No," said Luffy, eyebrows furrowed. "What's wrong, Zoro?"

"Nothing." He decided to give in for now and push her from his mind instead of dwelling on it the whole night. There was no way it was all that important, anyhow.

They hung around only a few minutes longer, enough time to congratulate Luffy and say goodbye to everyone else, then they went on their way back to Zoro's place, from sidewalk to taxi to sidewalk again, into the door and up the stairs.

Without either of them making the conscious decision to, they pulled to a stop in front of the practice room.

"Let's fight," Sanji said. They'd been so quiet on the way home that it startled Zoro to hear him.

"Okay."

Sanji let out a soft breath, and they walked into the practice room together. They took a moment to drag out the mats and lay them down, then Sanji began to stretch carefully as Zoro took up Shusui and Sandai Kitetsu from their rack.

It was a parody of the match just an hour previous - they circled around each other, Sanji hopping on the balls of his feet, Zoro with both swords poised ready to move.

In the same split second, they came for each other. Sanji pivoted on his right leg and swung his left up, catching Zoro right in the shoulder, just as Zoro's swords caught Sanji in his unguarded midsection.

Their timing synced up almost exactly. When one prepared to move, the other did too. And when one dropped back, so did the other. They were almost the perfect match in that there seemed no way for them to do anything but continually dance around each other, trying to land a blow at the same time.

However, it just served to key them up rather than calm them down. They were sweating and panting within minutes, so they took a short break to strip out of their hoodies and t-shirts. Then they were at it again.

It wasn't a genuine viciousness that suffused the room, but there was an intent about it all the same. When Zoro lashed out with Shusui, he completely intended to hit Sanji with it. And when Sanji threw a kick at Zoro's kidneys, he put all of his force behind it. What had started as something to tire them out was quickly becoming a fight that they were both genuinely invested in.

After a certain point, they got sick of guarding and it became a dirty, knock-down drag-out scuffle of swords and legs. Sanji got a lucky hit in against Zoro's solar plexus and as he went down, gasping for air, Sanji pummeled him with repeated kicks, blocked only by Zoro holding up his swords to catch each one. The force of it vibrated up his arms.

Still, he was up again after a few seconds, holding Sanji off just long enough to catch his breath, and then he bore down with no finesse, striking wherever he could manage

It continued until neither could hold themselves up anymore, and then they collapsed on the mats together, breathing hard, sweat pooling over their now-bare skin. They lay arm's length apart as their breath settled and their hearts stopped pounding so hard, but their eyes stayed on each other the whole time.

Bruises had bloomed across Sanji's bare chest and sides in the long, thin outlines of the backs of Zoro's swords. He couldn't resist the urge to reach out and trace his fingers over them, eyes on Sanji's face the whole time to make sure he wasn't going too far, but there was little expression there as he did so, especially not pain.

"We've really got to stop doing this," Sanji said some minutes later.

Zoro frowned sullenly, drawing his hand away from the mottled skin. "It was your idea."

"Mm. But it could give people weird ideas."

"Like what?"

"Like that we're bad for each other," Sanji said, head tilted back against Zoro's outstretched arm.

Zoro chuckled as he leaned in to press a kiss against Sanji's exertion-flushed cheek. "Do _you_ think we're bad for each other?"

Sanji was silent in thought for a moment. "No. I think we were once, though. Or at least I was bad for you."

Zoro didn't know what to say to that, so he said nothing. Eventually they managed to pull themselves off the floor and drag their worn bodies into the bedroom. It wasn't anything but sheer exhaustion that put them to sleep that night.

* * *

Saturday was the last free day they had in common before Sanji headed for Lyon, so of course that was the day he chose to do all the mundane, unimportant things that could have waited until much later. Zoro would have been perfectly satisfied to lay in bed all day with ice on all of the aches that had bloomed overnight, but it wasn't like he was going to say no to Sanji.

After a breakfast of bacon and kale omelettes, they showered and changed Zoro's disgusting sheets that were probably caked in sweat at that point. The practice room had been left in disarray the previous night, so that got tidied up as well - mats were folded and put in the closet, and the haphazard pile of clothing that remained went into the laundry basket.

Around noon, they collapsed on the couch, halfway to exhaustion.

"... You put the picture up," Sanji said after a second of staring at the entertainment center.

Zoro looked up, though he knew exactly what Sanji was talking about. It was the framed picture Sanji had given him on Christmas, which he now knew had come from Usopp's camera. In the past couple weeks since he had put it up, he'd practically _memorized_ that picture, the way Sanji looked so comfortable leaning into Zoro's shoulder, the way Zoro himself didn't stir from his sleep at all, as if he knew what Sanji felt like even when he was unconscious, and was okay with it. "Yeah."

"It looks good."

"Yeah."

"You know, this really wasn't how I imagined we'd be spending our last day together," Sanji said, heaving a sigh.

"I don't mind. Do what you want to do."

What Sanji apparently wanted to do was to sit and watch cooking shows all day. So that's what they did.

It wasn't the kind of thing Zoro would have ever seen himself doing. He was a man of simplicity, working by patterns, and though Sanji had begun to be part of those patterns, it was still bizarre in its normality. Of course, it was all laid over with Sanji's scathing commentary of every subsequent show they flipped through, so it wasn't as though it was _boring_.

Throughout the day, they left the couch only for drinks and snacks or bathroom breaks, and by the time night rolled around, they were practically vegetative in their mutual states of laziness.

"I don't feel like cooking tonight," Sanji said, and Zoro's mind was simply blown.

It made sense though, he supposed. Cooking was what Sanji did at work all day, then he came home and cooked for himself or for Zoro. It probably got tiring... but it still shocked Zoro to the core. He simply didn't know how to deal with a Sanji who didn't want to cook. "We can order pizza, I guess," he said, still somewhat dumbfounded.

"Awesome."

So two pizzas, one supreme and one with pineapple and ham, were ordered, and subsequently consumed.

It was late when they finally dragged themselves from the depths of the couch. Zoro had a crick in his neck and all of the painful bruised places were even more painful after a day of sitting on his ass.

They moved up the stairs, Sanji's shoulder knocking against his occasionally. It was dim in the bedroom, with only the light of a streetlamp filtering in through a crack in the curtains along with the shadows of raindrops that striped the walls.

"I'm too sore to take my clothes off," Sanji announced with a sigh.

"Stop whining. You wanted to fight."

"Yeah, but it feels like you hit me across the hip with a tire iron as hard as you could," Sanji said. He was stiffly trying to take his pants off with almost comedic levels of unsuccess.

Zoro circled around the bed and roughly unbuttoned Sanji's jeans for him, pushing them down enough that he could step out of them. "You kicked me in the throat, but you don't hear me sobbing about it."

Sanji made a displeased noise and put up his arms for Zoro to pull his shirt off. As it lifted, it revealed welted lines and greenish-yellow bruises covering Sanji's skin.

"Fuck," Zoro whispered, a harsh sound that broke the almost dreamy quality to the room. He traced one finger over a long bruise on Sanji's waist, and revelled in the hiss that he released at Zoro's light touch.

"Does it look bad?" Sanji asked, worry in his voice.

It looked... like Sanji had definitely been in a fight. But in a sick kind of way, to Zoro, it looked beautiful. He wanted to put his hands all over the mess he'd made of Sanji, dig his fingers in, make it all the worse. It was a feeling that he'd experienced before, but one that felt disgusting and shameful.

Yet as Sanji turned to see why Zoro was so silent, and caught the predatory glimmer in his eye, he didn't look frightened. In fact, he met it straight on with no hesitance.

There was something shocking about it to Zoro. To have it recognized, firstly, and to have it unquestioned. It sent a shock through his core that settled low and heated in his belly.

The moment stretched, neither of them wanting to be the first to break the silence, until Sanji lifted a hand and pressed his fingertips to a bruise just below Zoro's collarbone. It stung, and Zoro's instinct was to recoil, but he forced himself not to. He let Sanji touch and press, nails biting into the flesh, which left behind a strange combination of aching and burning.

Zoro wouldn't have trusted anyone else in the world to do it. But Sanji had always been good at telling the difference between playing and genuine fighting. He could see that line as easily as if it were physical, and though he'd toed it more than a few times, he never crossed it.

Now he watched Zoro's face in the dark as he felt out each ache. It was like he was trying to learn it anew - what felt good despite its pain, what was unbearable. It was a map of feeling that he traced with his fingers as though it was braille, ghosting from one continent of green and yellow flesh to the next. Finally, he drew to a stop, palm resting against Zoro's lower stomach. "Do you want me to do this?" he asked quietly.

Zoro wondered. Did he? Would it cross a boundary? Or would it open them up to something new? "Yes," he said at last, voice harsh and loud in the quiet room.

In an instant, Sanji was on him, pushing him to the bed. They went down in a tangle of limbs, grunting every time a bruise got elbowed or kneed, and came to a stop curled toward each other on their sides.

There were kisses traded then, gentle ones that contrasted with the pain of Sanji's fingers pressing into each bruise. Slowly, he went to his knees, forcing Zoro onto his back so he could climb over him and position himself atop Zoro's hips.

"You look good like this," Sanji said. It seemed to surprise him that this had come out of his mouth, but he nodded a little as if to reassure himself that he meant it.

Zoro said nothing, instead curling his hands over Sanji's bruised hips.

Sanji's gaze was caught on him for a few moments longer, then he leaned over and found lube and a condom in the drawer. He seemed awkward as he prepared himself, wincing whenever he moved wrong, but he finally seemed satisfied, and rolled the condom onto Zoro.

They'd become relatively practiced at this together by now, and any awkwardness was usually smoothed over easily by Sanji's laughter, if not Zoro's. It was still something special every time, something new that he hadn't noticed before, or something Sanji did differently. It seemed a little silly to him to treasure something so strange, but Zoro couldn't help it. To see Sanji like this, to be allowed with him in such a moment, seemed like something to cherish.

And not just because he'd been wanting it for the better part of his life. Not just because it was something he'd found himself imagining abstractly more times than he could count. Because the Sanji he'd met a little under two months ago was someone so wholly different. Because despite that, he was also the same kid who used to be so excited to get to help Zeff make dinner every night. He was the same kid who used to talk in his sleep. In him there was at once all of the bad things he'd been when he was younger, and all of the bad things he was now, the same way he was all of the good things he'd been when he was younger, and all of the good things he was now. At times it was hard to collate them in his head.

Yet that was the face he'd always known, twisted with discomfort and pleasure. And that was the hand he'd held countless times when Sanji was just a toddler, too young to hate Zoro. And it settled him a little to realize that this was someone he knew intrinsically, someone who had been intertwined with him for so long.

He finally knew what Sanji had meant when he'd talked about inevitability the other night. It hadn't been inevitable that it would become physical, but it _was_ inevitable that they would always know each other this much. Fate wasn't at play here. It was more than that. Like Zeff had said, they were magnets, pulling constantly toward each other. Over a great distance and through too much time, but it happened - they'd found each other again.

And Sanji had finally found himself settled flush against his thighs, Zoro deep inside of him, and his nearly-black eyes stared down at Zoro in the dark. His hands were poised over Zoro's chest, as if unsure whether to touch.

"Do it," Zoro said.

Barely a second after he spoke, Sanji was pressing his fingers deep into any skin he could get them on. It was almost agonizing, the strength in his hands combined with the deep, broken veins that his kicks had caused. And it was good. It hurt so much that it was _good_ , as if to remind him that he shouldn't only be seeking those things that seemed pleasant at face value.

As Sanji began to move above him, only slightly disrupted by soreness, Zoro dragged his hands up Sanji's thighs. They were unmarked, except for a couple welts across the mid-point, probably inflicted when Zoro was on the ground one of several times.

"If you want to do it, do it," Sanji said as his head dropped down slightly. His cheeks were flushed, and a slight sheen of sweat was starting to cover his chest and forehead.

Zoro did, pressing his thumbs into the small, skinny lines, and Sanji tensed, rearing up as if startled, but settled back after a second.

They kept it up, pushing into each other's pained places, but always keeping attuned, knowing if it was alright or if it was too much, and pressing harder or letting up accordingly.

Eventually Sanji had to lean down and push his lips against Zoro's. He thought he knew that this was typically a signal for when Sanji was about to come, so he grabbed him around one thigh and pulled out, dropping him into the nest of sheets and pillows before pushing back in.

Sanji let out a sigh against his lips as Zoro started to thrust, harsh and imperfect, barely timed. Even as Sanji tried to move underneath him to meet each thrust, Zoro just pressed down, digging his palms into the meat of Sanji's thighs, and fucked him as hard as he needed to.

And Sanji just encouraged him, letting himself be held down despite the somewhat sour look that had crossed his face at first. He dug his fingers into Zoro's scalp and dragged him down into a sloppy, needy kiss, only letting go when he was satisfied, but not letting him stray far.

The insides of Sanji's thighs were slippery with sweat, and his forehead and upper lip were now beaded with it too. In the heat of the moment, Zoro felt there was nothing strange in licking at it broadly, to which Sanji let out a quiet chuckle.

There wasn't much use in trying to hold out where they couldn't. Zoro came first, pushing deep into the heat of Sanji's body, and stayed there as his orgasm was wrung out of him, leaving him exhausted and somewhat noodly of limbs.

But Sanji wouldn't let him stay there for long, shoving at the top of his head as if to force him further down, and Zoro got the point after a moment. In a second, he'd pulled out, tied off the condom, tossed it over his shoulder to where he hoped the trash can was, and dove down.

He let Sanji fold his legs over his shoulders as he closed his lips around the tip of Sanji's cock. His certain brand of fervor wouldn't be appreciated, he knew, so he forced himself to slow down and take his time, sucking and licking until Sanji's nails were clawing into his scalp.

It didn't take anything special for Sanji to come. One second he was panting, shoving his hips uselessly up toward Zoro's mouth, and the next he let out a soft gasp and pressed his hand against Zoro's shoulder, the unspoken signal for him to pull back.

Zoro didn't, kept his face burrowed in against Sanji's hip, mouth around his cock, and swallowed methodically when Sanji let go, pulling back only when he started to whine about being sensitive.

He wiped at his mouth with the back of one hand as he sat on his knees. Sanji looked completely fucked out, like he would drop if he wasn't already laying down.

"I always knew we were going to grow up to be sexually fucked up," Sanji said at last.

Zoro chuckled. "Yeah? Why's that?"

"Just think about it. We were obsessed with trying to beat each other's asses as kids."

"So?" His voice was slightly hoarse from having Sanji's cock down his throat, and it barely sounded like a word when he spoke it so much as a breath of air.

"I guess we're still doing that even now."

But fighting with him wasn't about aggression. It was about being able to feel it in every bruise and every ache the day after, that Sanji was working just as hard as Zoro was to be strong enough to reach his dreams, and that it was okay to test themselves against each other to prove it, even if it hurt in the process.

It was different, Zoro knew, because it was less about the anger these days and more about how connected it made him feel to a time when he would have given _anything_ to have this, to have Sanji as his equal. And he just couldn't let go of the past even when the future came to replace it.

* * *

The room was filled with the sound of rain tapping on the windows. A glance at his clock showed that it was 6:13, two minutes before his alarm would go off, and he went ahead and flipped the switch so as not to wake Sanji.

Getting out of bed was equal parts painful and slow. A glance down showed that not only were the bruises from fighting even worse, there were new ones in the shape of Sanji's fingertips. He sighed and glanced back at the sight of Sanji still in bed, golden hair spread across the pillow, face slack and soft in sleep. From the shoulders down, he was bundled in the sheets, but what poked out showed Zoro that he hadn't been disturbed.

A quick shower later, he got dressed in his uniform (unwrinkled and not on the floor for once - Sanji was to thank for that) and leaned over the bed to press a gentle whisper of a kiss behind Sanji's ear.

"Mm. Wh'are you doin'?" Sanji asked, eyes opening just a crack to see Zoro before sliding shut again.

"Going to work."

"You eat breakfast?" Sanji mumbled, his face pressed into the pillows serving to make the words harder to decipher.

"Nah. It's fine, I'll find something later."

Sanji didn't answer; he'd fallen back asleep. Zoro smiled and pulled the covers back down over his feet where they had wriggled out, then left.

* * *

It was a little bit after ten when Sanji drifted into Zoro's office, looking uncertainly about himself. Zoro wondered for a moment if he had fallen asleep at his desk and was just dreaming Sanji was here, until he caught Zoro's eye, smiling and walking forward into the room. "I brought you something," he said, holding up a paper bag.

"Come here," said Zoro. He let go of his mouse and pushed back from his desk, turning to accept the kiss that was delivered upon him.

Sanji placed the bag down beside the keyboard and sat on the corner of the desk, angled toward Zoro. "It should still be hot. I left your kitchen pretty messy though."

"That's alright. Not like I did the dishes all that often before you came around."

"I'll go back and clean them up, just wanted to make sure you had something to eat." It didn't appear that he planned to just drop it off and run though, not with the way he was still sitting there, watching as Zoro unpacked the bag.

Most of it was wrapped tight in aluminum foil, but there were tupperware containers holding fruit salad and home fries as well. He opened up the aluminum foil packages to reveal several pieces of bacon and a breakfast sandwich with sausage, egg, and lots of the fancy, melty smoked gouda that Sanji liked to buy.

Zoro smiled and hooked a finger into Sanji's front pocket, pulling him forward to place an indelicate kiss on his chin. "Thanks."

"No problem," Sanji said, grinning at him.

At that exact moment, Smoker strolled casually into the room with Tashigi on his heels. "What do you know about-" he started, until he saw the other person in the room.

"Oh..." Tashigi said softly, pushing her glasses up with one hand and cradling a cluster of files tighter to her body with the other. "Are we interrupting something?"

"Ah, no, I was just about to leave," Sanji said, blinking at her.

"You must be the one who has this jack-off wrapped around his finger," Smoker said callously. Peripherally, Zoro noticed that Tashigi's cheeks had flared up with a blush.

Sanji's eyebrows furrowed, and Zoro realized he was trying to fight down a laugh. "Something like that?"

"You either are or you aren't."

"I'm his boyfriend, yes. Not so sure about having him wrapped around my finger," Sanji said. He'd shifted to stand up, facing Smoker and Tashigi full-on now.

Smoker pulled his cigar out of his mouth for a moment, breathing out a long exhale full of smoke. "You should have heard him whining about you leaving."

"I wasn't whining. You asked me what was up, and I told you," Zoro interjected.

"Yeah, yeah. Anybody with eyes can see you're up the creek for him."

Zoro sighed and leaned back in his chair, which squeaked noisily.

"We can come back later..." Tashigi said softly.

"Really. I'm just about to go," Sanji said, smiling at her. She smiled back, and Zoro knew the feeling. Sanji sometimes had the kind of effect on people that made them want to smile at him even when he was saying horrible things. "You must be his lovely partner."

Tashigi blushed and shook her head. "No, I mean- Yes, I'm his partner."

"It's so nice to finally meet you," Sanji said, his voice dipping into a silken purr. Zoro rolled his eyes up to the ceiling, exasperated.

"It's very nice to meet you as well," Tashigi stuttered, well beyond flustered. It only increased when Sanji took up her hand and kissed the back of it.

"Did you come here to flirt with all of my employees or what?" Smoker asked.

"Feeling left out?" Sanji inquired with a devilish smile. "Would you like me to call Ace in and have him take care of that for you?"

Smoker's face soured and he gnawed on the end of his cigar. "If that brat shows up here, I'll have both of you thrown in a cell together."

Zoro had long since given up on being part of the conversation and was digging into his home fries, supremely amused.

"Hm. Your loss," Sanji said with a sniff of disdain. He turned back to Zoro, and gave him a lingering, close-mouthed kiss, which was good since Zoro was still chewing rather aggressively on a mouthful of bacon. "I'll go back to yours and clean up, then get a shower and leave."

There was something that became warm and pleased at the idea of Sanji being in his house when Zoro wasn't. He didn't know why he liked the idea of Sanji in his space so much, but it filled him with some kind of content all the same. "That's fine. I'll see you later."

"Yeah. I like you," Sanji said with one final kiss on the point of Zoro's cheekbone.

"Like you too," Zoro replied, and barely managed to tear his eyes off of Sanji's back as he left the room.

"A charmer, that one," Smoker said, sarcasm drenching his voice.

"He's very charming," Tashigi agreed, in a manner that suggested she hadn't quite picked up on Smoker's tone.

"Hn. Did you two actually need anything?" Zoro asked.

"Yeah. What do you know about a woman named Victoria Cindry?" Smoker asked.

"Never heard of her."

"She's an actress. Or she _was_ an actress. Shot herself about a month ago. Problem is... she was known to have contact with one of the Shadowcutter's suspected underlings." Smoker paused, blew out a cloud of smoke, and Tashigi continued for him.

"Yesterday evening a woman went to pay her respects to a family member, and she noticed that Victoria Cindry's grave had been disturbed. The casket was dug up last night. There isn't a body inside of it anymore."

"He's not as well-known for it, but the Shadowcutter's stolen and mutilated corpses before. It wouldn't be strange if this was his work, or the work of somebody connected to him," Smoker said.

"So we're thinking that this suspect she was in contact with is even more suspicious now," Zoro said, nodding slowly. He glanced down at his breakfast, and wondered if the topic was going to get any more grisly than this, or if he could chance eating it.

"And now we're going to look into it," Tashigi said, nodding. She dropped her armload of files onto Zoro's desk and smiled at him. "I'll come back after you finish eating breakfast." And with that, she left the room.

"Listen," Smoker said after the door had closed. "You watch out for Tashigi if you two start getting too deep into this. She's damn good, and she can take care of herself, but she's exactly the kind of girl these guys would be after. They're sick fucks, don't ever forget that. There's too many things they could do that would scar her for life without even laying a finger on her."

Zoro nodded solemnly. "Yeah. I'll keep my eye out, same as always."

Smoker nodded, and gritted his teeth together before making his admission. "Looks like you were right. The Shadowcutter is back in business."


	9. Each Coming Night

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not much to say here, just a quick warning before we start this chapter, for mentions of suicide prior to the story. And with that out of the way, onward!

Dr. Heinrich Hogback was a man in his mid-sixties, recently retired from his position as a neurosurgeon at the same hospital where Chopper worked. He was tall and round, had a receding hairline with a scar splitting his forehead right underneath, sunken eyes, a long, sharp nose, and a somewhat wicked mouth. For all intents and purposes, he was normal, if not a little frightening to look upon.

Yes, he probably _seemed_ normal enough. That is, unless you had read the additional files detailing how he was disagreeable toward patients, not liked by his co-workers, and was paranoid to the point of unreasonability when anyone tried to get into his business. There was also his tendency to lurk around the morgue, and the particularly revealing fact that every year he donated a large sum of his income to a shadowy organization called _Thriller Bark_ that had been investigated several times with little result, though one fact was known: it was a moving front for the Shadowcutter's dealings.

None of that meant he was a body snatcher. Of course, it didn't mean that he _wasn't_ , either.

Over two years ago, he had treated Victoria Cindry a single time for her traumatic head injury following a car accident. He didn't stop seeing her after that, though; he'd been obsessed with checking on her progress, visiting her at the hospital weekly as she worked toward recovery. He was known to be temperamental on days when she couldn't quite recall who he was, but also disconcertingly sunshiney on days when she did. And constantly, he tried to convince her to start a new life.

He was in love with her, Zoro figured. The kind of hopeless, idealistic love that occurs when one is infatuated with who they imagine someone to be, rather than who they actually are; not for how hard they work in life, not for the sound of their laughter and the tight, happy feeling felt in the chest at getting to hear it, and certainly not for the precious chance to be with them as they achieve their goals. Hogback had probably not felt privileged to be in Victoria Cindry's presence. He'd wanted to be the center of her world, and most likely thought it was his god-given right.

Disgusted, Zoro moved the files on Hogback out of the way and picked up the singular, thin folder about Victoria Cindry. He knew it wasn't going to be a happy, and had been holding off on it.

The topmost item was a vanity photo of her, and beneath that was a newspaper clipping about her humble beginnings, with a picture of a tiny, seven year old Victoria smiling up at the camera. The next was another clipping, this time about her accident. The third was a short detail of her diagnosis in the emergency room, and her course of treatment. And after that was a fax from the psychiatric ward at the hospital, passed on to them by her family, mentioning her short-term memory loss and damage of fine motor skills, along with a rather in-depth analysis of her severe depression following the incident. It seemed to go on and on, making Zoro feel more and more troubled the more he read.

She hadn't even fully recovered the usage of her body before she'd killed herself. It was tragic, they said. Such a promising young woman. So proud of her craft. Sweet. The kind of person who smiled almost always. A long life before her.

He knew somebody like that. Somebody who worked hard for herself, somebody with talent and promise, who was really the only family he had, who had always been by his side, whose life had almost ended before it had even really started.

Victoria Cindry's story wasn't just troubling in the general, what-a-shame sense. It was troubling in the deeply personal, too-close-to-home sense. Because that could have been _Kuina_. And though he knew that she was alive, he couldn't help that his mind instantly jumped toward the _what if_ of the matter, something that seemed to happen unavoidably when it came to thinking of the accident.

He sighed and set the files aside, stacked together all the tupperware from the breakfast Sanji had brought him, then stood and stretched the stiffness out of his back. When he sat down again, he let his head fall against the back of the chair, staring up at the ceiling for a moment before closing his eyes. He forced himself to think not of Kuina but of Hogback, who was well known to be a recluse now. Having kept a house in Poughkeepsie for the last ten years and what with his sudden disappearance from city society, they were starting to think he'd relocated to it on a full-time basis.

It seemed likely. After all, what kind of person attempted to maintain their habit of surgically dismantling corpses in an apartment in New York City when they could do the same thing in a nice, remote house out in Poughkeepsie? The neighbors probably complained less about the noise, at any rate. Zoro laughed darkly.

"What's so funny?" Tashigi asked as she entered the office, taking a seat in the chair across from Zoro's desk.

"Nothing." Zoro opened his eyes to look at her expectantly.

"She had a fiancé," she said, in response to his look. "He stuck by her the whole way. We should visit him soon and see if he can tell us anything."

"Yeah. Did you already talk to him?"

"No, he's been visiting with family out of state. Smoker got ahold of him, he says he should be back next week."

"Does he know her body was stolen?"

Tashigi tilted her face down, grimacing. "No. He's been through a lot already. He deserves to have some time to regroup."

Zoro nodded, knowing that it was probably for the best. It wasn't as though he wasn't used to waiting, either.

"There's something else that sets Hogback apart, by the way. A former professor of his left behind a fairly regular journal when he died, and in it, he mentions two students that became pretty close through his classes... Apparently they occasionally volunteered to take the cadavers to disposal together. Funnily enough, the bodies never actually made it _to_ disposal. Sounds a little familiar, doesn't it?"

"If he didn't name the students outright, then it's not an identifying link," Zoro said dismissively.

"Yeah," she sighed. "We'll keep working on it, okay?"

And they did, even when the hours passed away and they turned up nothing but details that they already knew. At the very least, discouragement didn't come as easily to them these days.

* * *

The house was empty and quiet when Zoro got home, though there was a note on the kitchen table telling him that dinner was in the fridge. It was a hero sandwich that he ate distractedly in between scribbling nonsense connections in his notebook at the kitchen counter, and after, he went upstairs to take a long nap. He woke up completely discombobulated around midnight, and despite trying to close his eyes and fall back asleep, his body and mind refused to shut down, and he finally gave up and texted Sanji. ' _you're probably not still awake, are you?_ '

The reply came quickly. ' _i am_.'

' _you should be in bed._ '

' _so should you. what's up? are you okay?_ '

' _bad dreams. can't fall back asleep._ ' Zoro paused and deleted it. He didn't want to have to talk about what it was he'd dreamed of that was causing his mind enough distress that it refused to settle down. ' _i napped too long, now i fucked up my sleeping schedule_.'

' _long day at work?_ '

' _kind of. what's got you up?_ '

' _hehe. you want the perverted answer to that or the honest answer?_ '

' _honest._ '

' _a friend had a little too much to drink and needed me to go out to manhattan and make sure he got home okay. i just got back from tucking him in 20 minutes ago._ '

Zoro breathed in softly. He was at once both relieved that nothing was wrong, and also concerned that Sanji felt the need to get out of bed so late at night just to make sure a friend got home. It wasn't surprising - for all his outward prickliness, Sanji was, first and foremost, the kind of person who wanted to make sure others were comfortable, and safe, and well-fed.

And Zoro wasn't jealous. He wasn't the kind of person that became so entangled in what he wanted from someone that he forgot that he hadn't been made a promise.

It was just... well, what kind of friend really needed someone to take care of them that much when they were drunk? He specifically refused to think of himself and his own problems with getting lost being heightened by drinking, and sent a response instead. ' _oh. you should try to get some sleep then._ '

' _you too. are you sure you're alright?_ '

' _yeah. sorry for bothering you over nothing_.'

' _i don't mind. i'm going to get some rest now. gotta work early tomorrow. try to go back to bed._ '

' _okay. goodnight._ ' And with that, Zoro turned his phone off to avoid anymore distraction, and lay silently for nearly an hour, mind hurtling between the distressing similarities of Cindry and Kuina, before finally, blessedly falling back asleep.

* * *

After work on Wednesday, Zoro packed up two days worth of clothes and went straight to Sanji's apartment. Because Thursday was his only day off before he'd drop Sanji at the airport the coming week, he wanted to make sure to get in all the time he could possibly manage, though he wasn't going to tell Sanji that those were his motives. When he'd texted to let him know, he'd made up some bullshit about loud construction on his street, and Sanji ate it all up.

He dropped his bags in the bedroom and made himself comfortable on the couch since the apartment seemed to be fairly lacking in the presence of a certain significant other, and he flipped on the TV, ready to let it lull him into a nap.

The front door opened sometime before 7:30, when Zoro was halfway between asleep and awake, and Sanji came in looking exhausted. Peeking around the side of the couch, Zoro watched him drop his bag on the floor, strip out of his coat and scarf, and hang them in the hallway closet before kicking out of his shoes.

"Hey," Zoro said as Sanji walked into the living room at last.

Sanji smiled tiredly and lifted a hand to wave at Zoro. He disappeared into the bedroom and didn't appear again for another half an hour, shambling through the living room in a zombie-like manner. Then he fell onto the couch and refused to move.

"Long day?" Zoro asked, amused.

"Mm." Sanji's eyes were closed, head tilted against the back of the couch. Zoro watched a bead of water slide down from his wet hair to trace along his neck, then slip under his shirt. "Nothing to do now but wait for the aspirin to kick in."

"Headache?"

"Migraine since two," Sanji said through a yawn. "A charley horse from being on my feet for fourteen hours, haven't eaten all day, and I got three hours of sleep last night." It wasn't a complaining tone that he used, but a simple fact-stating one.

"Do you want me to make you something to eat?"

"You don't have to," Sanji sighed, and Zoro was sure he wasn't imagining the unspoken ' _you'll fuck it up_.'

"I can't make fancy shit like you can, but I can at least make you a sandwich," Zoro said, half-offended.

"If you want. I don't think I'm going to be awake enough to eat all of it." And true enough, Sanji looked about ready to knock out at any second.

Zoro sat still for a moment, slightly annoyed at Sanji's flip-flopping behavior, but then he gave in and stood up. Everyone had bad days, and as far as he was concerned, Sanji was allowed to stew in it if that was what he wanted.

In the kitchen, he put together a turkey sandwich and grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge. He'd debated coffee for a few seconds, but that would only put off the problem. What Sanji needed was a good twelve hours of sleep, not to be awake and dealing with Zoro just because he was there. Hopefully he was falling asleep right now, and Zoro could eat the sandwich instead.

But Sanji _was_ still awake when Zoro placed it all on the coffee table, and he sat up with a groan, grabbing the plate and scarfing the sandwich down as quickly and messily as Zoro had ever seen him eat anything in his life. Sanji tended to be neat and precise about everything; hell, he even put his napkin in his lap when he was eating at fast food places.

"Do you wanna sleep now?" Zoro asked, eyebrow raised and trying not to chuckle as Sanji put the plate back down on the table and drained the water bottle.

"... No. I think I'm at the stage of tiredness where you're so tired you actually circle back around to being wide awake."

"Okay." Zoro leaned across the couch and tugged at Sanji's legs until he got the message and put them up in Zoro's lap.

"What are you doing?" he asked, cracking open one eye to look up at Zoro, who said nothing, just pressed his thumbs deep into Sanji's calf muscles until he let out a sudden, pained groan. But he didn't try to squirm away, just held still, toes curling with discomfort as Zoro forced the muscles to loosen and relax in the left leg before he moved on to the right and repeated. He only relented when Sanji had stopped whining, and he rubbed his thumb comfortingly across Sanji's skin, against the grain of hair.

"Better?"

"Yeah. Thanks."

Zoro nodded despite Sanji's eyes being closed, and dragged his hands down Sanji's leg, folding them around his arch and pushing his palm deep against the ball of his foot.

"That's nice..." Sanji murmured. He sounded like he could drop off to sleep at any second, utterly content, so Zoro put all of his strength into forcing out the pockets of tension until Sanji had sunk limply into the couch, by which point his breathing had gone soft and even in sleep.

Zoro debated between picking him up bridal-style, or just tossing him over his shoulder to take him to bed. It was an amusing thought, but he knew Sanji'd kick the shit out of him for carrying him anywhere, so he let him lay there a while longer.

In the meantime, he made a sandwich for himself and ate it quietly over the kitchen sink, looking out the window at the dark night sky above. After washing his crumbs down the drain, he finally woke Sanji up to guide him toward the bedroom. It was slow goings with Sanji's drowsy shuffle, but they made it eventually, and Sanji fell into the embrace of his pillow happily, not even bothering to pull the covers over himself.

Amused, Zoro pushed the sheets down and maneuvered Sanji under them, then slid in beside him, but didn't quite get close to him yet. No, he took a moment to look at Sanji in the dim light: laid perfectly still, head peeking out from the sheets, body twisted slightly away from Zoro. Under his eyes were dark circles, and Zoro suddenly found himself wondering if he shouldn't have bothered coming here today. Surely Sanji's well-being was more important than Zoro trying to pack in time with him before he left for Lyon.

But at the same time, he was selfish, and glad at least that he'd ensured Sanji had eaten and gotten to sleep in his own bed. It was good enough to have made sure he'd have that much less to worry about when he woke up the next morning.

Eventually, he slid closer and curled around Sanji, tucking an arm around his waist and anchoring them together for the night.

* * *

Hours later, he awoke to Sanji bustling around the room, wrapped in a towel as he got ready. He stayed silent, watching sleepily, until Sanji finally seemed to realize that he was being watched, and he jumped a little to see Zoro's eyes open and following him around the room. "Did I wake you up?" he asked, looking apologetic as he dropped the towel and shrugged into a button-up.

"No." Zoro pulled the sheets up from where the cold air was starting to leave him chilled, and let out a loud yawn at the same time as his stomach grumbled.

"I don't have time to make breakfast for you, and there's only chocolate muffins from a few days ago in the bread basket, sorry," Sanji said as he sat down on the bed to pull on a pair of socks.

"You don't have to do anything for me."

As if he hadn't even heard Zoro speak at all, Sanji continued. "Oh, there is a decent cafe down the street though. They make a pretty good scrambled egg dish with smoked salmon roe."

Zoro grunted noncommittally and rolled closer so he could slide his arms around Sanji's waist from the side. His exposed skin was warm, and it was easy to see that the bags under his eyes were mostly gone now. He looked much better than he had last night.

"Okay, let me go now," Sanji said, trying to stand despite Zoro's arms tightening further to hold him in place. "Seriously, I have to be at work in an hour."

Reluctantly, Zoro released Sanji, who stood and wiggled into his pants in a sinuous manner that was far too enticing for Zoro to handle this early in the morning.

When at last he was all ready, Sanji leaned down to place a kiss on Zoro's forehead. "I'll try to get home a little earlier tonight."

"Okay. Don't work yourself too hard."

"Working too hard is in the job description." Sanji winked and pushed off of the bed. "See you tonight. I like you, by the way."

Zoro hummed in agreement, ready to fall back asleep, and he rolled over into the warm space that Sanji had left behind.

* * *

The second time Zoro woke up, it was because his stomach had reached a truly disturbing level of rumbling in his sleep. He rolled out of bed ungracefully, tripped over his pants, and just barely managed to keep himself from smashing his face into the wall. It was good Sanji wasn't around - he'd probably have been fucking _dying_ of laughter from seeing it. Zoro frowned, even though the Sanji he was reacting to was the one in his head.

After using the bathroom and washing his face, he dragged himself into the kitchen for breakfast. A search of the fridge and cabinets showed that they were in need of a restocking, so he gave in and went for the bread box. He grimaced as he ate three of the chocolate muffins that Sanji had mentioned, and though the sweetness of them made him feel ill, they did the job of filling him up.

For the majority of the remaining morning hours, he slummed around. It was strange being in Sanji's apartment when he wasn't there - not quite in the vein of feeling like he was intruding, but the realization that there was so _little_ about it that made him feel connected to Sanji. He couldn't really look at anything (excepting the kitchen and the multitude of photos) and feel like he was existing in Sanji's _home_. Everything had character, but it wasn't necessarily _Sanji's_ character. It was unsettling.

After a couple hours of flipping through daytime TV, he retrieved his laptop and decided to do some some actual work, even though it was his day off. They'd already mostly given up on finding anything about Hogback that they didn't already know, so he switched tactics and looked up Victoria Cindry on the off-chance that something about her would give him hints on Hogback.

Mostly, it was articles regarding her suicide - tributes, other actors expressing their regrets, the odd trashy tabloid piece that disrespectfully picked apart reasons why she would have done it. As he went further back, there were ones about how she had most likely given up on her acting career, or how her rehabilitation wasn't going as smoothly as doctors were hoping for.

None of them showed any kind of promise. They continued to spackle on layers in the painting of her personality as kind-hearted and charitable, but they didn't say a damn thing past the surface of her surgery.

He put the laptop down around four and sat at the island in the kitchen eating leftover spicy sausage with alfredo pasta. His thoughts were empty, unable to come up with any connecting factors. There wasn't solid evidence. There wasn't a solid connection. He wasn't prepared to go into this, and since Hogback had never formed any kind of relationships with his peers, there weren't very many people to tell him, _reliably_ , about the man.

After he finished eating and cleaning up, it was back to the drawing board. He looked for arrest records concerning grave robberies or thefts of bodies in the past couple years and found only a handful, most of which had already gone to trial. Then he glanced through the morgue databases he had access to in order to see if any bodies had been claimed after the fact, and found none that seemed suspicious in any case. Either their suspect hadn't been up to very much lately, or he'd been incredibly sneaky about it.

He was coming up with a load of nothing, and was about to give up for the day, but then he realized there was something he hadn't done, something that should have been _obvious_.

The NYPD archived logs on the Shadowcutter and his associates were several hundred pages long. There was no way he'd be able to read it in a whole week, let alone a night, so he searched for relevant terms: 'corpse' or 'grave' or 'cadaver' - anything that he could likely connect Hogback with.

What he came up with was plenty enough to get him out of the rut. And the image he was starting to put together as he read was disturbing as hell.

_Cultists_. That was the only way he could see them. They took bodies and apparently tried to reincarnate them with what they perceived as the 'shadows' of others. It sounded like utter bullshit, and yet just because it seemed unreasonable to him didn't mean they had the same mindset as he did.

Previously, all he had known of the Shadowcutter's gang was that they did the typical kind of crimes, drug and arms trafficking, those types of things. They were usually pretty low-key, and he and Tashigi tended to get shoved toward what was perceived as the most dire cases, so Zoro wasn't very familiar with their operations beyond that. But this kind of shit was fucking _dire_. They didn't do whatever their cult ritual bullshit was often, but there was certainly a pattern to it, and it got tangled up with more than just grave desiccation besides.

He'd gotten so caught up in correlating everything so that he could email it to Tashigi that he didn't realize Sanji was home until arms draped over his shoulders, then soft lips and scratchy stubble pressed against his cheek. Zoro jumped. It was shameful, he knew, and Sanji laughed at him, soft and rumbling in his ear.

"What are you doing?" Sanji asked, not bothering to withdraw.

"Work," Zoro muttered, minimizing the window that was open to a photograph of the grisly remains of a body after the Shadowcutter was done with it. "How was your day?"

"Busy," Sanji said, vaulting the back of the couch to land beside Zoro. He looked much less tired-out than yesterday, and was acting more upbeat in general. "You managed to stay here all day and not get bored?"

Glancing down, Zoro realized he was still only wearing the pair of flannel pants he'd slept in last night, and felt suddenly disgusted with himself for spending literally the entire day on the sofa with breaks only to eat and piss. "I got really into what I was doing," he said defensively.

"How about you take a break now..." Sanji's lips curled into a wicked smile, and Zoro prepared for the worst. "And get into something that _isn't_ work?"

"You're ridiculous. Are people actually attracted to you?"

Sanji laughed and nodded. "You are. That makes you even more ridiculous than me."

"Well I'm sure whatever it is, I'm going to end up doing _work_ anyway."

"Listen, I've been on my feet for the past fourteen hours. You've been sitting on your ass on my couch since probably ten in the morning at the _earliest_. The least you can do is put your goddamn back into it."

"How about you go take a shower and we'll talk about it. You smell like oil and livestock innards." Still, Zoro gave in and closed his laptop, shoving aside a pile of books so he could place it on the coffee table to deal with later.

Sanji huffed as he stood and stretched upward, spine and shoulder joints popping. He trailed into the bedroom, and Zoro listened as the shower turned on several feet away. After a minute or two, he followed, dropping onto the bed where he was content to lay quietly in the darkness until Sanji came out of the bathroom, dripping wet with a towel around his waist.

"Better now?" Sanji asked.

"I don't know. Come here and I'll tell you."

Sanji came closer, stepping over the pile of discarded clothing on the floor, and he stopped in front of Zoro, who reached out and grabbed him by the wrist. He was clearly caught off balance, and fell easily onto Zoro, damp and flailing.

"What was that for?" Sanji asked grumpily.

Zoro didn't answer, just wrapped his hands low around Sanji's waist, fingers pressed into the wet dip of his spine. He could feel minor patches of tension, but he bypassed them to work his hands under the towel, cupping them around Sanji's ass. Meanwhile, he mouthed along the slender neck in front of his face, licking up droplets of water as the soft citrus scent of Sanji's hair wafted over and filled Zoro's nose. "Yeah, better now," he murmured, tracing his tongue over the lobe of Sanji's ear.

Sanji grumbled in annoyance, but relaxed deeper into Zoro's hold. There was a stillness in the room as he rolled Sanji into the sheets and pulled the towel off of him, tossing it somewhere behind himself. It felt almost as if time had stopped, or very well didn't exist at all. And he wanted to believe it. If this night could last even a second longer, if he didn't have to surrender Sanji to five days in France, he'd be happy.

Logically, of course, he knew that the clock was ticking at the same speed as it always did, but he still took his time moving down Sanji's body, pushing one of his legs up and holding it under the knee as he dragged his tongue along the paler skin of his thighs.

Pointed silence emanated from Sanji, almost as if he were holding his breath, as Zoro's mouth drifted further and further down, pausing here and there to nip or suck, and he let out a loud, harsh gasp when Zoro finally licked over his hole. Zoro pulled back for a moment to look up at him. "Is that okay?" he asked, gripping Sanji's knee tighter.

For a moment, Sanji seemed stunned, but then he nodded, and Zoro dove back down, flicking his tongue across Sanji's entrance. Distantly, he could hear the sharp intake of breath, feel Sanji's legs trembling to either side of his shoulders, but he ignored it for the sake of licking at Sanji until he was letting out low moans and gripping hard at what he could reach of Zoro's hair.

He came back up after several minutes, satisfied with himself, and found Sanji flushed and breathing hard. Zoro practically dove on top of him, cradling his hands around Sanji's cheeks as he pressed feverish kisses to his brow.

But Sanji didn't seem to be in the mood for tenderness; he whacked Zoro in the face with a bottle of lube, the smirk on his lips in direct contrast to how wrecked he looked, and Zoro took the cue easily, wetting his fingers and dragging them down to where his tongue had just been. After a cursory prep, Sanji handed him a condom and he rolled it on, slicked it up, and pressed in.

"I've been thinking about this all day," Sanji confessed once Zoro had seated himself. His hands dug into Zoro's biceps, and his eyelids had lowered down to half-mast. "It would've been nice to stay here with you."

Zoro grunted and paused to drag Sanji's legs up over his shoulders for a better angle. "Must be hard doing what you love."

"Aren't you doing what you love right now?" Sanji asked with a cheeky grin.

_More than you even know_ , Zoro thought. "Yeah, getting you off is definitely the light of my life."

"Because you're not getting any pleasure from this at all, right," Sanji said. His hands curled loosely above his head, hair falling into contrasting disarray against the black sheets. It was all too appealing of a sight.

"None at all," Zoro confirmed, thrusting in slow and hard. The angle made Sanji's body feel tighter than it normally did, and it was difficult to really get any kind of movement going, especially after being tugged down to receive a kiss, which forced Sanji's body to fold practically in half what with his legs still hooked tight over Zoro's shoulders. But he did his best to make it good.

"You're so selfless."

"Mm. It's just because I'm expecting dinner after this," Zoro mumbled against Sanji's cheek. It was practically stifling between them, breathing each other's air and pressed together like they didn't even want a single molecule between them. Sanji hadn't shown any discomfort from his folded-up position, though, so Zoro remained there, one hand on the back of his left thigh and the other on the bed so he could keep his balance.

And he seemed to have finally gotten the angle right, because Sanji's mouth opened silently and he choked on his own breath, having to take a few moments before he could speak. "Keep doing that and you might actually get it."

So Zoro continued as told, putting off conversation until Sanji was panting and clawing at his back with one hand, trying to fit the other between them to fist around his cock.

But Zoro wasn't having any of it. He fit his fingers around Sanji's wrists and forced them to the bed, giving Sanji a dangerous look that said he wasn't going to get to bring himself off just yet. It made him glare and snarl at Zoro, but even still, he was coming just a couple minutes later from the drag of his cock against Zoro's hard stomach alone. It only took a few strokes into the spasming of his body and Zoro let go too, hips jerking until he was drained.

They rolled apart more quickly than they usually would, sweaty and panting, and probably more than a little sore and aching in Sanji's case. Zoro went to the bathroom to clean himself up before coming back with a washcloth for Sanji, who wiped up as well, then crawled over Zoro to touch down on the floor. "Lay there and don't move until I come back," he called back as he left the room.

Zoro was of half a mind to disobey, but Sanji was back a couple minutes later, wearing a pink apron with a panda on it and nothing else. It was such a strange contrast to the tattoos peeking out on his arms that Zoro couldn't hold back the rude laugh that wanted to escape from his mouth. "Are you trying to start round two or something?"

"Nope. I'm cooking you dinner."

"Doesn't look like you're doing any cooking to me."

"It's happening. You just have to let it do its thing. Cardinal rule."

Zoro grunted and rolled onto his side to better face Sanji. "Yeah? What are you making for me?"

"Can't tell you," Sanji sing-songed, and disappeared again.

He was gone for a little over half an hour, stranding Zoro without the remote and yelling at him every so often to make sure he hadn't fallen asleep. But finally, he returned with a bottle of red wine and a plate piled high with steak, green beans with bacon, and fries, which he handed to Zoro as he climbed back over him.

Frankly, Zoro was stunned. It was just that Sanji seemed so far from the kind of person who would willingly sit in bed naked with a bottle of wine and a plate of steak to share between them. He was obsessed with manners, and it was strange that he'd allow this. _Still learning new things about him every day_ , Zoro thought mildly. It felt like a rude awakening every time, even though the fact that Sanji had changed constantly stared him in the face.

He pushed those thoughts to the side and instead picked up his fork and dug in before Sanji had even gotten himself stripped out of the apron and settled against the pillows. The meat was perfect, succulent and juicy, cooked just right. "S'good," he said around the first bite.

"Don't talk with your mouth full," Sanji replied automatically, spearing a chunk of meat on his fork and bringing it to his mouth. He ate it tidily, then wiped his mouth with a napkin that he seemed to have pulled out of nowhere. After, he put his fork down and grabbed a corkscrew from the nightstand, with which he opened the bottle of wine.

"It's scary that you keep a corkscrew in your bedside table," Zoro said, specifically skirting around the green beans for more meat.

"What? Isn't that one of the necessities? Lube, condoms, dirty magazines, corkscrew?" Sanji asked, amused, and he took a sip straight from the bottle.

"I wonder how you'd feel if you were suddenly murdered and the police came to investigate. They jump to the worst conclusions, they'd probably think you were some kind of pervert."

Sanji raised a goading eyebrow at him, daring him to go on.

"Because you _are_ a pervert," Zoro finished.

Sanji reached over and smacked a palm against his chest, hard enough that it jolted the plate in Zoro's hands and sent the fries skittering to the edge, though that also could have been a side-effect of how hard Zoro was laughing. "Or the only other explanation is that you're the kind of loser who drinks wine in bed constantly."

"There's nothing wrong with drinking wine in bed," Sanji said defensively, and took another sip just to prove his point. "It's a fine pastime."

"Is that what everyone in France does? Sit in bed with a cigarette and a bottle of wine, wearing a beret and eating baguettes? Is that what you're going to do when you go back?" Zoro taunted.

Another swipe was aimed at him, though he fell back against the pillows just in time so it didn't connect. "What about you, don't you read manga all day and eat ramen for breakfast, lunch, and dinner?" Sanji asked.

Zoro didn't even offer up a reply, just skewered several chunks of steak on his fork and shoved them into his mouth with no delicacy.

In response, Sanji squawked and thunked the bottle of wine down on the nightstand so he could grab the plate from Zoro. "I have to eat too you know!" he yelled.

Zoro snatched the plate back, and speared up a couple fries on the fork and stuffed those in his mouth too. "You can eat the green beans," he said around the food.

"Or I can eat the steak since it was _my_ sweat, blood, and tears that went into it!"

"That's unhygienic," Zoro commented.

Sanji's face was turning slightly red, getting all worked up with the easiest of jabs from Zoro. "Says the guy who's spewing potato all over my bed!"

"You can change the sheets, but you can never unswallow another person's bodily fluids."

"If they were even there in the _first place_ , they would have cooked off," Sanji said, glaring.

"Pretty sure I just tasted tears," said Zoro. He was having all too much fun riling Sanji up, but he forced himself to keep from smirking in triumph. "That bite was definitely salty and sad."

"Bastard! I never cry!"

"That's not what I remember." Zoro popped a fry in his mouth and smugly chewed on it as Sanji started to reach a boiling point.

"What the hell are you talking about?!"

Zoro popped another fry in his mouth, taking his time with an answer. "Bambi."

Sanji snorted, his whole posture relaxing just a tad from where it had tensed up. "Everyone cries about Bambi," he dismissed.

"Not everybody cries about it for three days straight though," Zoro said. Disappointingly, the majority of the meat was gone, and the fries were starting to disappear too. Yet again, he skipped over the green beans, which were unsurprisingly still plentiful, and stabbed one of the last few pieces of meat, only to have it knocked off by Sanji.

They had a brief battle of forks before Sanji yanked the plate away and shoved the remainder of the steak into his mouth. "Here," he said, without even swallowing, and passed the plate back to Zoro. There was an evil grin on his face, though it was distorted somewhat by the fact that his cheeks were puffed out with food. "You can have the rest."

Zoro frowned and ate the last of the fries, then placed the plate on the nightstand and let out a loud belch. He could almost _feel_ Sanji rolling his eyes.

After a while, he got up to rinse the dishes and put them in the dishwasher while Sanji went out on the balcony for a cigarette. Then they got ready for bed and laid there watching TV for a while, until a little before midnight they shut it off and sent the room into darkness. Outside the wind blew loudly and the cold pressed through the windows, making the air beyond the sheets seem all too undesirable. They settled together and fell asleep.

* * *

Something Zoro had quickly learned about Sanji was that, though he hated the minutes between waking up and getting coffee, he was definitely a morning person. If he was awake, he wanted to be up and about, which was directly opposite of Zoro, who'd laze in bed for the entire day if allowed to.

So it didn't surprise him to wake up and find that Sanji had wandered off. What _was_ surprising was to find that he wasn't anywhere in the apartment. Generally, he was pretty considerate about leaving a note at the very least, but there was none, and finally Zoro had to give up the search and start getting ready for work.

While on the train to the police station, he fired a text at Sanji, but got no answer back. It was useless to worry, he knew. Most likely it was something simple and he'd feel stupid when he finally got ahold of Sanji, but it didn't stop him from jumping to conclusions.

He was too distracted by it to focus on work once he got there, though he did his best. Tashigi looked fairly annoyed with him, and he could understand it. He didn't make any excuses for himself.

It wasn't until around lunchtime that Sanji finally called him, and before Zoro could even get an annoyed word in, he was already apologizing. "I am _so_ sorry," he said. "One of the new prep cooks burned her hand so bad it practically peeled the skin right off. I've been over at the hospital with her since 6, I just haven't really had the time to text you or anything."

Zoro deflated. "It's fine, I was just worried."

"I know. I'm really sorry."

"Shit happens, it's not a big deal."

"It's just disappointing. I was hoping we'd get to spend a little more time together before I had to leave." And Sanji really _did_ sound regretful about it.

"You can come over tomorrow night," Zoro said. "I have to work Sunday but I don't mind if you stay over."

"Mm. Okay."

"And I'll be taking you to the airport on Wednesday. It's not like we won't see each other before you leave." Tashigi was raising an eyebrow at him as she chewed on her salad, so he turned away, refusing to meet her amused gaze.

"I know, but it just annoys me. I wish there was more time."

Zoro laughed. "Yeah, yeah. You'll probably have so much fun while you're there, you won't even think of me."

"That's not true. I'll think of you all the time," Sanji said, with all the passion of a sappy rom-com love interest.

Zoro cleared his throat loudly, ashamed at the sudden wash of happiness that had filled him. "You better. I have to get back to work now."

"Okay. I'll text you tonight. I like you."

"Yeah, I like you too. Bye."

They hung up and at the very least, Tashigi had the good grace to act like nothing had happened.

For the rest of his shift, he finally managed to focus on what they were doing, which was sorting through any evidence they had managed to get their hands on from the previous body thefts Zoro had read about. For the most part, it was boring work, and not much of it made sense: there were things such as baggies of rust particles off of shovels, or soil samples, and strangely, even a torn, dirty envelope with an intricate but broken red wax seal on it.

Nevertheless, they took it in stride, making decent headway until Tashigi accidentally spilled her coffee all over some print-outs about a giant of a man who'd died nearly two hundred years ago, and whose body the Shadowcutter's guys had dug up within the past fifteen years. She went into panic mode until Zoro told her they were just copies, and the final half hour of his shift was spent trying to make her feel a little less shaky. It was clear the case was getting to her - he hoped it wasn't as apparent how uneasy it was making him.

But to her, it probably was. They were a good match despite Smoker's concerns with pairing them up when he'd been promoted to lieutenant. Zoro and Tashigi complemented each other in very specific ways - he kept her from getting too clumsy, and she kept him from jumping to the worst and most bizarre conclusions. And they were good at wordless communication by this point, so when she hugged him before leaving work that night, he knew it wasn't just because she needed the comfort. It was because she knew he needed it just as much.

* * *

The next day, Zoro came home from work to an empty house, which was disappointing, but Sanji finally thumped up the stairs around eleven, and too tired to stay up and spend time together like they'd planned to, they fell straight asleep.

Sunday morning before work, Sanji made breakfast and kissed him goodbye, along with offering a promise to still be around when Zoro got back home. And sure enough, when he walked through the door ten hours later, Sanji was in the kitchen, standing by the stove and stirring something in a large pot.

"Dinner?" Zoro asked.

"Demanding."

"No, _is_ it dinner, not _where's_ my dinner," he clarified.

"I'm making some stuff for you to eat while I'm gone," Sanji said as he turned to lean against the counter, and he nudged his glasses up his nose, though they were so fogged up from standing over the steaming pot that it would be a wonder if he could even see at all.

Zoro moved across the room quickly, not stopping to drop off his coat or shoes, just pulled Sanji into a grateful kiss. "You don't have to do that."

Sanji shrugged. "If I didn't, I'd come back and find you dead of eating too much instant ramen."

"I don't think you can die from eating ramen for a whole week," Zoro said, idly dragging his fingers over the small of Sanji's back. He felt an all too familiar rush of fondness striking through him, and wished harder than ever that he didn't have to let Sanji leave.

"Just accept it and say thank you," Sanji said with a roll of his eyes.

"Thank you. What is it?"

"This is white chili, and there's spaghetti sauce in a slowcooker in the fridge. You'll have to turn it on before work when you want it, but there are directions on the fridge, don't worry. I bought stuff for sandwiches too."

"You went overboard," Zoro said.

"You eat a lot. And I didn't make as much as I normally would."

"But you do realize you'll only be gone for five days."

"Yeah. Nothing wrong with variety, or leftovers."

"Fine... What's for dinner tonight?"

"Not sure yet," Sanji said. He'd removed himself from Zoro's arms to stir the pot again, then he put the lid on and turned back to Zoro. "What are you in the mood for?"

"We can order something," said Zoro. "That way you don't have to start something else."

"Alright. That's fine."

"Okay. Pizza?"

"Sure."

Zoro disappeared into the depths of the house, calling in a pizza order before stripping out of his uniform piece by piece. He took a quick shower, then toweled off, put on a pair of jeans and a ragged Misfits t-shirt, and headed back downstairs, only to find that the pizzas had already arrived and were waiting for him on the coffee table.

They ate it out of the boxes, fingers and mouths greasy, and eventually moved upstairs later in the evening. There was a single round of slow, uncoordinated, but intense sex that left the both of them sweaty and gasping, and they fell asleep easy that night.

For the next two days, their lives were chaotic hazes of preparation. For Sanji, it was getting all of his luggage ready and making sure everything was going to be alright at the restaurant while he was gone. And for Zoro, it was preparations to further their investigation of Hogback; Cindry's fiancé would be coming back from out of state on Thursday, and after a little bit of coaxing, he'd agreed to speak to them.

After work on Tuesday, he headed straight to Sanji's, already feeling tired out. For some reason it was always the menial work that seemed to drag. And once at Sanji's, there was no rest either. Most of their time was spent going through Sanji's packing checklist, making sure everything was turned off that needed to be turned off, going through the fridge for anything that would expire before he got back home, taking out the trash - all chores that left little time for any kind of meaningful goodbye.

A taxi was called a little before eleven, and they loaded it up with Sanji's bags before heading off. They didn't speak the entire ride over, didn't even touch beyond the brush of fingers. It was a time purely for appreciating each other's silence, for being comfortable like this. Because for the next week, there was going to be a very different and much less comfortable kind of silence: the silence of absence.

But there was no more of that when they arrived at the airport. Sanji became a man on a mission after they got his luggage out. He tugged Zoro through the doors, past the crowds of people in line, and straight for the bathroom, of all places.

"What's your problem?" Zoro asked, somewhat annoyed, as Sanji finally shoved him through the men's room door.

"Pretty sure you don't want to have a final quicky in the middle of an airport terminal," Sanji said, continuing to push him toward the spacious stall at the far end of the room.

"Pretty sure I didn't say anything about wanting to have a quicky at all." But still, Zoro reluctantly got inside, and Sanji slid the bolt home behind them.

"You can't say you don't want one more for the road," Sanji said with a smirk, dropping his luggage on the floor.

"You actually _want_ to sit on an eleven hour flight smelling like come?"

Sanji had slid to his knees, and was tugging at the button of Zoro's jeans, biting his lip intently as he did so. "Just a blowjob. I'll brush my teeth after."

Zoro sighed and stared down at Sanji's head. "Or you can fuck me."

"Trust me, I'd like nothing more, but I don't have stuff on me," Sanji said. He leaned in and drew his tongue up the length of Zoro's cock, fitting his lips greedily over the tip.

Zoro let him do what he liked for a couple minutes, but then he gently carded a hand through Sanji's hair and pushed him back at the same time as he reached into his back pocket with the other hand for his wallet. "Here," he said, handing Sanji a packet of lube and a condom from inside.

"Always prepared, aren't you?" Sanji asked with a sharp grin. He ripped his button and zip open and rolled the condom onto his cock, which had seemed to take quite an interest in sucking Zoro off.

There was something so un-sexy about it, Zoro had to laugh. Getting off in an airport bathroom before Sanji left for France for five days was really _not_ how he'd imagined today starting.

Sanji stuck his tongue out, mostly to distract from the blush rising on his cheeks, but Zoro didn't tease him anymore, just turned to face the divider of the stall after pushing his jeans down around his knees.

Quick work was made of preparation, Sanji giving him two fingers only before sliding in. It was a little bit painful since it'd been almost a month since they'd done this, but in a way, Zoro appreciated it. The slight sting of pain was enough to ground him, to make him remember that they were in a bathroom stall in a public place and that any minute, someone could walk in. The tiniest part of him wished that he'd just stuck with the blowjob after all, but that part was quickly drowned out by the pure _relief_ of Sanji settling inside him.

Sanji held onto his hip with one hand and braced the other on the divider. He drew out slowly, forehead resting against the nape of Zoro's neck. "You don't know how much I like seeing you like this," he sighed as he found his rhythm, which wasn't at any kind of angle to brush across Zoro's prostate, but even if it didn't feel _good_ , it didn't feel bad either.

Within a couple minutes though, they both realized it wasn't working, and after a bit of fumbling, Sanji pulled out and made Zoro turn around and step out of one of the legs of his jeans. Then he pressed Zoro's thigh up in a stretch and pushed back in, and finally gathered up Zoro's other leg around his waist.

Zoro felt wildly off-balance for a moment, wondering if Sanji was really going to be able to hold up all of his weight, but Sanji proved that he could do it, pressing him tight against the divider and rolling his hips in easily, and Zoro kind of forgot to worry after that, because this was a sight he'd never gotten to see before. Nobody had ever been able to hold _him_ up, and there was a very specific kind of arousal he felt at looking down his own chest and stomach, abs clenching and skin beginning to have a sheen of sweat, to see Sanji's pelvis meeting his body. He didn't know what he looked like to Sanji right now - could only imagine the way his body looked opening up for him - but the hungry, pleased look on Sanji's face was enough to let him know that it was good.

"I'm going to laugh if you miss your flight for this," he said roughly, reaching an arm around Sanji's neck to play with the soft strands of hair there.

"I won't miss it," Sanji panted. His nails dug sharply into the flesh on the back of Zoro's thigh, counterpoint to the rush of pleasure every time he brushed against Zoro's prostate. It was good in this position, and Zoro had to admit it was going to be something he intended to think about a lot while Sanji was gone.

And then the bathroom door opened.

His eyes widened, then narrowed, trying to give Sanji the signal to lay off, but Sanji ignored him, just kept _going_ with a wicked smile on his face. He was even more deliberate in the snap of his hips, deep and slow, trying to force the sounds out of Zoro.

Zoro wouldn't have it. He put his hand over his mouth and bit down on the meat of his palm, steadfastly refusing to let a single sound slip forth, but Sanji's face was now contorted with determination. One hand left Zoro's waist and wrapped around his cock, jerking him off with almost ruthless efficiency.

Beyond the stall, the guy was whistling to himself as he went about his business, and Zoro sent out a plea that he'd hurry it the fuck up and _leave_. Distracting himself had been the critical error though, because the next thing he knew, his body was seizing up around Sanji, and his hand dropped just enough that the groan building in his throat slipped right past his fingers.

The guy stopped whistling, and Sanji wrung another noise out of him when he rocked up onto his toes and let Zoro slip down the wall just slightly, bringing him down harder on Sanji's cock.

"Fucking stop it!" Zoro whispered heatedly, tugging hard on Sanji's hair.

"Nope," Sanji replied, and his smirk was pure evil.

The bathroom door opened again, and Zoro felt thankful until he realized that someone else had come in rather than anyone leaving. There was the awkward shuffle of feet choosing their place at a urinal, and Sanji pointedly shoved his hips up into Zoro, who couldn't fight down the moan even as he tried to strangle his own vocal chords by force of will.

"Aw man, somebody's gettin' some last minute time in, that shit's not fair," said the new occupant, in a very stereotypical surfer dude manner of speaking.

"Er, I don't think-" began the other guy, who sounded exactly as embarrassed as Zoro felt, but he was cut off by the stereotypical one, who pounded a hand against the stall door.

"Get it, dude!" he shouted.

"We should go," said the embarrassed guy, and there was a scuffle as he apparently pushed the surfer dude toward the door, which opened and closed just a few seconds later. Then there was silence.

Sanji laughed softly and hoisted Zoro higher up, burying his face against Zoro's neck to suck and nip at the skin there. The movement of his hips was beginning to be slightly erratic, and he was jerking Zoro off more frantically too, which finally pushed him over the edge despite how he'd been sure he'd never want to have another orgasm again after that whole incident.

His head fell back against the metal divider as he came, pushing his hips up into Sanji's fist hard. Sanji followed him a few seconds after, arms shaking dangerously in his attempt to keep Zoro up at the same time. They stayed together just like that until they'd caught their breath, and when Sanji finally pulled free, Zoro slid to the floor on still-shaky legs.

There was an ache in his lower back and in his thighs, and definitely the remaining feeling of having been fucked, but nothing that painful. His ego was definitely the most damaged, and he could still feel himself blushing hotly at what they'd just done.

They put themselves back together, and Sanji made sure to give Zoro several placating kisses, slow, leisurely ones that conveyed more apology than a longing not to leave. That was fine, though. They weren't quite goodbye kisses, just preparing-for-goodbye kisses.

When they left the stall, the bathroom was thankfully still empty, and Zoro washed his hands and splashed some water on his face as Sanji did the same, then tidied up his messy hair.

And then there was nowhere to go but back into the terminal, coming to a stop near the lines leading into departures. It was finally down to goodbyes.

Sanji wrapped his arms around Zoro's neck, clinging tightly for a few seconds, until Zoro put his own arms around Sanji's waist. They held onto each other for entirely too long, though it still wasn't long enough, and when Sanji finally pulled back a little, it was only to initiate an equally-long kiss, this one packed to the brim with everything they hadn't gotten to say in the small amount of time they had.

"I'll call you, okay?" Sanji said when he drew back, lips wet and red.

"Mm."

"Don't die without me."

Zoro gave him an annoyed look, though it mostly for show. "I lasted a decade without you, I think I can do it again."

Sanji smiled, cupping his hands over Zoro's cheeks. "You'll miss me more if you talk to me every day, though."

"What makes you so sure of that?"

"I missed you more than ever after you came back to me in Maryland," Sanji said, and Zoro's heart clenched tightly, wondering how that could possibly be true.

"It's just a week. I'll survive."

"You're not gonna ask me to stay?"

"Nah. Get out of here, I'm sick of your face."

Sanji laughed. "I'm sick of your face too." He leaned up and pressed another kiss to Zoro's mouth. "I'll miss it still, though."

"Yeah? You too."

"Okay. I'm out of here. I'll talk to you as soon as I get a chance."

"Yeah. Be careful."

Sanji nodded, and gave Zoro a final, devouring kiss. And with that, he turned his back and walked away.

Zoro stood watching and waiting until Sanji cleared check-in, then disappeared into the seating area. He felt a sense of bereavement then, so brief and sharp that he barely realized what it was until he'd walked out of the airport, gotten on the subway, and was halfway home.

This week was going to feel so wrong without Sanji. He tried to reason with himself - that this wasn't anything like last time, that he'd gotten to say goodbye at the very least, that Sanji would be home before he knew it. But Zoro had never listened to reason.

And falling asleep after getting home was the hardest it had been in a while. Not even the lingering scent of smoke and citrus on the pillows was enough to replace Sanji.


	10. So Hard to See

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I tossed up a mix of all the title songs for Full Disclosure so far, which you can find [here](http://bunansa.tumblr.com/post/49534427787/full-disclosure-the-a-sides-volume-one-8tracks), if you're so inclined. Just a general "unpleasant business" warning for this chapter, nothing incredibly graphic. Thanks for reading.

As Zoro rolled out of bed and began his routine the next morning, he kept a tight grip on his phone, not wanting to let it go on the off-chance that Sanji had something to say. He had been kind enough to send Zoro a text letting him know that he was laid over in London, but that had been a while ago, and for the most part, there was radio silence.

Of course, he ended up having to put it down eventually for more important things, namely work, but that didn't mean he was happy about it. In fact, it nagged at his mind all day, even through texts from Sanji saying that he'd landed in Lyon and was headed to his hotel, and when Zoro went home that night, he couldn't shake how wrong it felt to be so far away from Sanji, in more than just the physical manner.

So after he got inside, took off his coat, and put the pot of Sanji's white chili on the stove, he checked the clock. It was a little past 6:30, which meant it'd be getting pretty late over there, but he wondered nonetheless if Sanji would still be awake.

For a few minutes, he waffled between getting yelled at for waking Sanji up, or continuing to feel the awful part of himself that already missed Sanji, and finally sent a message. ' _awake?_ '

' _uh huh. finally off work?_ '

' _yeah. no luck, don't really want to talk about it. how was your day?_ '

' _it was fine. i did some walking around and then got dinner. it's weird having to speak french constantly again._ '

Zoro smiled down at his phone, suddenly caught up in the rather endearing mental image of Sanji fumbling out sentences for the first few hours. ' _you mean it's hard trying to remember how to pick up girls in french._ '

' _nah. i have somebody back home._ '

' _your hand?_ '

' _i'm breaking up with you!_ '

The phone was ringing before he'd even finished typing out his reply, and he answered it with a laugh rather than with words.

"You're an asshole!" Sanji said.

"You like it," Zoro replied, still chuckling.

"Hmph. You're lucky that I do."

"I am really lucky," Zoro agreed.

There was the sound of a lighter flicking on the other end of the phone, then of Sanji inhaling on his cigarette. "Shouldn't you be eating dinner right now?"

"It's heating up. Shouldn't you be sleeping right now?"

"Jet lag. You'd think I'd wanna sleep as soon as possible considering how late we were up and how I didn't sleep any on the flight, but apparently that's not the case."

"Want me to tell you a story until you fall asleep?" Zoro asked jokingly.

"No. If you just want to talk though, that'd be nice."

Distractedly, Zoro stirred the chili, turning the heat down a little so that the surface wasn't quite bubbling. "What do you want me to talk about?"

"I don't know. Anything."

"... I'm stirring chili right now."

"Okay, how about you tell me about something _interesting_?" Sanji requested, playful annoyance in his voice.

"I can't just think of something interesting off the top of my head."

"Tell me why you know all of my friends."

"They're not just _your_ friends."

There came the soft, choked sound of laughter held back, and Sanji's voice was mockingly serious when he spoke. "They were my friends first."

Zoro hummed and slouched onto one of the barstools. "I met Ace about a year ago when he came to drop something off at the station. He just walked up to me and told me he'd seen me around and wanted to take me for a drink. We got to know each other, then he introduced me to Luffy, who introduced me to Nami, and the rest is kind of history."

"You know, they used to mention you, but I didn't really connect the dots. I should have," Sanji said through an exhale of smoke.

"You really should have. Not exactly a common name."

Sanji sighed. "I think I was just afraid to... If it was really you, then I'd have to face you eventually and I guess I wasn't ready for that."

"Even if I'd still been pissed at you, which I wasn't, it's not like I would have started shit with you," Zoro said, and it was the truth. To take it out on Sanji so many years after the fact would have been childish, and he liked to think that was one thing he _wasn't_ , these days.

"Yeah, but I figured you had every right to," Sanji said. "After how shitty I was to you."

Zoro shrugged, even though Sanji couldn't see him. He didn't want to talk about the incident he knew Sanji was referring to, didn't even want to _think_ about it. For the most part, he preferred to imagine that it didn't exist at all, because things were a lot different now. But he wasn't going to let Sanji know that it still bothered him. "If you thought I'd give up on you because you were shitty to me once, don't you think I'd have done that a long time ago?"

Sanji laughed. "Point. I _have_ always been pretty shitty to you. That just seemed like the peak of shittiness."

"It was really fucking shitty, I'm not saying it wasn't. I guess it just wasn't shitty enough to make me stop caring for you," Zoro said. He got up, holding the phone between his ear, and stirred the pot again before placing the lid back down.

"And I'm really glad for that."

They went quiet for a few minutes, and Zoro wondered if Sanji had finally gotten tired enough to drift off. "Are you asleep?" he whispered, not wanting to wake Sanji up if he was.

"No," was the immediate answer.

"I wonder if you'd fall asleep if I came and put a blanket over your head or something. Like a bird."

Sanji snickered. "Maybe. Come try."

"Okay, let me just book a flight really quick," Zoro said mockingly.

"You get on that."

Zoro smiled as he sat back on the barstool. "What else do you want me to talk about?"

"I don't know. I'm kind of tired now," Sanji said.

"Do you want to go?"

"Just... sit with me a little while longer. You don't have to say anything."

"I can do that."

And so they sat on the phone in silence, listening to each other breathe, and it was almost comforting, almost _close_. The occasional hiss of white noise made that illusion slip, but it was enough to take the strange, stranded feeling from Zoro, at least for a little while, so he was satisfied.

At last, Sanji yawned into the phone and said, "Okay. I think I'm good."

"I'll let you go sleep then."

"Yeah. Hey."

"Hm?" Zoro asked, drawing himself out of his own descent into sleepiness.

"I miss you," Sanji said. There was an inflection in his voice that made him sound both proud of the fact and full of sorrow at the same time.

"I miss you too," Zoro replied, and let nothing be heard but the genuine fact that he did.

* * *

In the seat beside Zoro, Tashigi blinked awake and sat up with some effort. She'd napped in the passenger's seat most of the way to Amityville, which meant that Zoro had no one to tell him when he was going the wrong way. The end result was that, instead of the usual give-or-take of an hour, their drive totaled to nearly three.

But now they'd reached their destination, pulling up the driveway to a tall, narrow stone house. It was unremarkable, if you didn't count the fact that all of the shades were pulled on the windows, and that the whole place had a rather unkempt look about it, with the yard definitely not having been mown in more than a few months, and weeds and untrimmed bushes slowly overtaking the sidewalk.

"Cheery," Tashigi said.

Zoro chuckled, and they got out of the car and headed up the pathway to the front door, where he gave a few loud knocks. He rocked back on his heels as he awaited someone to come answer it, and when no one did, he leaned forward and rang the doorbell.

At last, there was the sound of footsteps inside, and the door opened to reveal a short, round man with wild blond hair sticking out at every angle. He had droopy brown eyes, with a scar over one of them, and was extremely pale, as if he hadn't been out in the sun for decades.

"Hello," said Tashigi, sticking out her hand. The man took it, looking almost confused, and shook it limply. "I'm Tashigi. The detective? We spoke on the phone?"

He nodded, and said in a wheezy voice, "Of course. Please come inside."

The hallway they stepped into was nearly as dreary as the outside had been, dimly-lit and a little dusty; the air was stale, as if nothing fresh was coming inside, and the walls were white, blank and bare. The living room had a little more character, though it looked like it should have been inhabited by an elderly woman rather than a man who had been on the way to marriage.

The floral couch Zoro and Tashigi sat on sent up twin clouds of dust, and they both coughed for a few moments as the man looked at them expectantly.

"Er. So, Mr. Hildon. If it's not too much trouble, could you please tell us about the relationship your late fiancé had with Dr. Hogback?" Tashigi asked after she'd regained her composure, folding her hands primly over her knees.

"Of course. Though I'm not sure you could classify it as a relationship. He mostly just spent his time trying to get her to notice him," he said. His eyes flicked about the room dodgily, though Zoro couldn't see that he had any reason to be so shifty. "He'd send her letters and flowers, and he called a lot."

Tashigi nodded slowly, clicking her pen. "Do you still have the letters?"

"She kept them with the other fanmail she received... I believe it's still in her apartment, since her family hasn't had time to come up and clean it out yet."

"Did she ever mention feeling uncomfortable around him?"

"She didn't," Hildon said, still in his meandering, wheezy tone. "Though she was the kind of person who rarely showed it or complained when she was uncomfortable... I think he made her feel threatened."

"Why do you say that?" Zoro chipped in.

Hildon turned his sleepy-eyed gaze on Zoro. "She just always seemed to feel trapped when he was around. Even when she could barely remember who anyone was, she looked like she didn't want to be anywhere near him."

Zoro pursed his lips to the side. "Did she ever say if he acted harmfully toward her?"

"No. I worried a lot, but she said he never made any physical moves toward her. Only... she did say that he'd say strange things sometimes."

"Like what?" Tashigi asked.

"She was never specific. She just said that he'd be nice one moment, and the next he'd say very cruel things. It felt like there was nothing I could do to help her, or to stop him. I tried to make sure that once she was released from long-term care, that he wouldn't ever see her," Hildon said, a gloom overtaking him that very much matched his home. "But he'd still stop by when she was in physical therapy sometimes..."

Zoro cleared his throat. "Did he ever approach her outside of the hospital?"

"No."

"Did you know anything of Hogback outside of his interactions with your fiancé?"

"No. He made it a point of never speaking to me."

"Is there any way you could give us access to her apartment?" Tashigi asked once she was finished noting down Hildon's words.

"I suppose so..." Hildon wheezed. "You can speak with her landlord, she could probably let you into the apartment."

"Do you have her address?" Zoro asked, and Hildon nodded, bringing out an old leather-bound address book from a side table, from which he carefully copied out a Manhattan address.

Tashigi pursed her lips as she took the piece of paper from him. "Well, thank you for your time," she said. "If we have anymore questions, we'll call again."

Hildon nodded and followed after them to the door, looking almost lost as they headed down the front stoop and back to the squad car, where they slumped into their seats and let out identical sighs of frustration.

* * *

An hour and a half later, well after their shift had technically ended, they'd pulled up outside of Cindry's apartment building. Inside, they'd shown the severe-looking landlady their badges and she'd briskly led them up to the sixth floor and unlocked the door for them before heading back down, with only a reminder to lock up behind themselves when they were done.

And now they stood alone in a dead woman's apartment. It felt untouched, frozen in time. Everything was covered in a thick layer of dust, but it had every appearance of being lived in. There were coffee cups sitting in the sink, a blanket laying messily on the couch as if it had been only recently snuggled under, and photographs everywhere. It was disconcerting, and Zoro felt a keen sense of being out of place as he walked through the uninhabited rooms.

The logical place to start looking was the hallway closet, so being the more logical-minded of the two, Tashigi took that while he headed for the bedroom. It was tidy in there too; the bed was made, the curtains spread wide over the windows to let light pour in, no clothes on the floor. There were knick-knacks and a jewelry box on the dresser, and lamps on the nightstands along with a digital clock, and the most prominent feature of all: photographs of Cindry and Hildon smiling happily at the camera.

He spared only a moment to take in his surroundings as he headed straight forward to pull the closet door open. As expected, it was mostly shoes and clothes, but when he glanced up, there were shelves holding large cardboard boxes, and he stretched up just enough to pull one down. It was heavier than he'd been expecting, and he stumbled a little under the weight even despite his strength.

Sure enough, when he carried it over to the bed and opened it up, there sat rows and rows of envelopes, all addressed to Cindry with varying returns. He picked one at random, and drew out a piece of folded paper that had a crayon drawing of a small stick figure holding the hand of a larger stick figure, helpfully labeled _Victoria and Risky_.

"I found them," he called into the hallway.

A moment later, Tashigi shuffled in. "That's all?"

"No. There's shelves full of them," he said, pointing toward the closet.

She peeked in, and let out a drawn-out sigh. "This is gonna take a while."

"Yep."

Over the course of the next couple hours, they went through the contents of each box, skimming for those with Hogback's return address. However, it wasn't until they reached the very back of the shelving that they found those. They sat in a box all to themselves, each one addressed to Cindry in the same handwriting, with a broken wax seal, and the same return address: Dr. H. Hogback, and the hospital's address.

They checked the last couple boxes to make sure they had everything, then packed up Hogback's letters, putting away the others almost undisturbed, and left.

After dropping that box off at the station, he and Tashigi had a late dinner together at a sandwich place down the street, and he didn't end up getting home until well past ten. It was too late to call Sanji, so he went straight upstairs to get ready for bed.

At some point in the day, his phone had died, and when he plugged it in and it powered on, there was a series of messages from Sanji, several detailing his day, a few inquiring if Zoro was surviving, and a single one saying that he missed him.

It was that one that had him smiling for the final half hour he was awake, and into the next morning as he got ready for work and put the slow cooker full of spaghetti sauce on low heat. And he kept on smiling, even when it felt like he had nothing to smile about, and should in fact have been frowning, because he knew it was going to be a rough day from the second he walked into the station. Their work for the time being consisted of going through every single document with a fine-toothed comb, and it wasn't anything approaching a quick process.

They confirmed many things, such as the fact that Hogback seemed to be very full of himself, and he liked to talk about all of his achievements. He was coercive, wheedling, and persistent. And just like Zoro had originally thought, he _assumed_ Victoria Cindry owed him something just because he existed. Hogback was cocky, but he played his cards close, and it was giving them approximately _nothing_ to work with.

At least, not until Tashigi had frustratedly started going through the old evidence they'd taken out a week ago. And suddenly, the torn, dirty envelope with the broken seal made sense, because it matched up perfectly with the ones they had collected from Cindry's apartment.

"Time for a search warrant," Tashigi sing-songed, sounding entirely too pleased. She set about gleefully typing up an affidavit on her laptop, and Zoro leaned back in his chair, which creaked in displeasure.

It was good, he knew, but there was just a part of it that made him uncomfortable, as if something was going to sideswipe them at just the wrong moment. Though they'd finally made progress, it seemed inevitable that something would come forth that would stop it. But he pushed that worry aside, if only because he knew there was no use fearing the worst when no matter what came, they'd have to deal with it all the same.

* * *

When Zoro got home that night (on time, for a change), he was cold and hungry, and he'd had a headache for the greater part of the day. But since sleeping and eating at the same time wasn't a possibility, he found himself turning up the heat and heading into the kitchen to check on the spaghetti sauce and to put on a pot of water to boil. He popped a couple aspirin into his mouth from the bottle sitting near the sink, then went upstairs to change into a ratty pair of jeans and a sweatshirt that were the only remains of his clean clothes, and headed back downstairs.

It had started to snow again earlier in the afternoon, and fat flakes drifted past the kitchen window as he walked by them. He found it was soothing to look at the soft white glow outside, but he felt Sanji's absence more keenly than ever when he remembered their one month anniversary, and how snowflakes had sat in Sanji's hair and eyelashes during the walk after dinner. The realization that they'd been together for over two months now was almost startling to him, and he took out his phone to send a message to Sanji, needing him to know that Zoro was thinking about him.

Of course, he couldn't exactly just come out and _say_ that, so he sent something a little less needy, but no less true. ' _spaghetti smells good._ '

' _it'll taste good too. family recipe,_ ' Sanji answered after a couple minutes.

' _i'm sure. i didn't wake you, did i?_ '

' _nope. just reading._ '

' _do you want me to call you?_ '

' _sure._ '

Zoro took a moment to get up and toss the noodles into the now-boiling water, then hit Sanji's speed dial.

He picked up after the first ring, sounding like he was smushed into a pillow. "Hey."

"Hey," Zoro replied. He trailed into the living room, dropping down to lay on the couch. "How was your day?"

"Busy. But good. The French team won again," Sanji said.

"You should be proud then."

"Eh. I thought Germany did better."

"Hm. What else did you do?"

"We drove to Saint-Étienne," Sanji said, pronouncing it in such a way that it was almost indecipherable to Zoro. "Did a little bit of sight-seeing."

"Playing tourist in your own country?"

"You've never been to every place in Japan, or the US, so yeah, I'm allowed to play tourist here. I've pretty much only ever spent my time in Paris."

Zoro hummed in acknowledgement, then stood again to check the pasta. He popped a noodle into his mouth, promptly burning his tongue, then stuck the phone between his ear and shoulder as he drained out all the water and fixed a plate for himself. All the while, Sanji chattered away about the Bocuse d'Or, the things he'd seen on their day trip, and how tomorrow they'd be driving up to Côte-d'Or. Zoro talked back between bites of spaghetti, and it was yet again not all that hard to imagine that Sanji was here with him despite the fact that his skin felt thrumming and alive, waiting for Sanji's touch to return to it.

"Oh, I got you presents too," Sanji said, once Zoro had finished eating and put his dishes in the sink, leftovers in the fridge.

"Yeah? What'd you get me?"

"What do you think?"

"I don't know, that's why I asked," said Zoro, with some annoyance.

"It's something that you're obsessed with," hinted Sanji.

"Uh..."

"Alcohol, moss-for-brains. Alcohol!"

"Oh. Awesome," Zoro said, making his way back to the sofa. This time when he laid down, he drew the blanket over from where it had been draped across the armrest and covered himself tiredly.

"What are you doing?"

"Laying on the couch in the dark. It's snowing here."

Sanji chuckled. "Wow, you're sure having fun while I'm gone."

"Yeah. It's a regular party."

They trailed off into silence. For a few minutes, the only sound was their breathing, until Zoro realized that the patterns of Sanji's exhalations were the exact same as when he was getting off.

"Really?" he asked rhetorically.

Sanji grumbled. "I'm sorry, it's just hard..."

"I'll say," Zoro said, cracking up at his own joke.

"Shut up! It's hard being away from you!"

Zoro went quiet again, listening to Sanji steadily growing more noisy now that he had no reason to be sneaky about it. He dragged a hand over the front of his jeans, rubbing without focus at the bulge there as it started to harden beneath its confines.

"Are you touching yourself?" Sanji asked at length.

"Not really. Do you want me to be?"

"I mean, I guess I wouldn't mind."

Zoro popped the buttons on his jeans, pushed them down along with his boxers, and wrapped his hand around his cock. It was already mostly hard and starting to get slick with precome, and he stroked himself a couple times before speaking again. "Okay. My hand's on my dick, now what?"

Sanji laughed. "I don't know. Talk to me, I wanna know what you're doing."

"Can't you just _imagine_ what I'm doing?"

"No. I'd rather you tell me."

"You should have a pretty decent imagination, considering all those years you only had your hand to keep you company," Zoro said, forcing down his laughter.

"Hey! Fuck you, ya know?" Sanji said indignantly.

"You wish."

The silence that emanated through the phone was so pointed it could have stabbed him, but Zoro just laughed loudly into the phone as he moved his fist tight and slow. "I dunno. I'm just jerking off, I don't know how else to tell you that."

"You have no concept of how to be sexy, I don't know why I'm surprised."

"Yeah, I guess some of us just don't have the time to cater to other people's whims on the standards of sex appeal," Zoro said. He bit down on his lip, rocking his hips up into his hand.

Sanji made an annoyed, wordless sound into the phone. "Stop fucking around, I have to pay for all this long distance calling. I want my money's worth."

"Okay, no more fucking around," Zoro agreed. "I'm jerking off, is that good enough for you?"

"But what are you _thinking_ about?"

"You," Zoro said.

Sanji made yet another sound of annoyance. " _What about me_?"

Zoro huffed. "Fuck, anything. Everything. There's nothing you do that isn't hot as hell."

"Specifics?"

"When you take control. I like that. And when you let me fuck you, sometimes you do this thing about halfway through where you just stop talking and get this look on your face like you can't think about anything outside of that moment. I hate it when you do that," Zoro said, dragging his fist up almost agonizingly slowly.

Sanji huffed out a laugh, though it was obvious that he was getting more worked up now that Zoro was doing what he'd asked him to. "Why's that bad?"

"It's fucking hot."

"Again I say, why's that bad?"

"Because I get off on thinking about what I do to you," Zoro said.

There was silence on the other end, and Zoro tried to imagine what Sanji could be doing. Was he biting his lip, holding back any sound from escaping? Had his mouth dropped open, slack and soundless as he jerked himself off? Or was he sitting there thinking about how stupid the things that came out of Zoro's mouth were? "I don't think you can even begin to guess what you do to me," Sanji said at last.

"Tell me then."

Sanji made a low groan of what Zoro figured was embarrassment, but could have passed for arousal just as easily. "I don't know how to. I've just never felt like this before."

"Like what?" Zoro asked. He was barely even moving his hand now, much more focused on hearing what Sanji had to say than on sexual fulfilment. It was silly, but listening to Sanji try to articulate his feelings filled Zoro with more satisfaction than a mere orgasm would.

"Like... I don't know. Whenever I think of you, I just feel good. I remember good things. And it's weird, because I don't think I ever felt like that around you when we were younger. Maybe it's more like when I think of you, I remember how comfortable home was. You're like the me-shaped indent in a childhood bed, you know? It took years to make you how you are, and you'll keep changing, but I'm always going to feel so glad to fall into you at the end of the day. I don't have to second guess myself around you because there's just a part of me that knows you won't think I'm strange. You knew me when I was worse, and I'm a lot better now, and I know that you know that, and you won't use it against me. It feels good."

"I do know it, but it's not like I think of you in terms of better or worse. You're just you, always. Sometimes you're an asshole and you don't think before you speak, sometimes you're the most thoughtful person in the world. Sometimes you treat people like shit, and sometimes you treat yourself like shit just to make someone else feel better. You're cold and distant one moment, and the next you're clingy and you want attention. You have the worst temper of anyone I've ever met, but you always feel bad about letting it out. That's just who you are. Everybody contradicts themselves. I don't want you to be perfect, and I don't want you to think you need to be, or that I expect you to be. Better or worse, whatever that means, I'd still want to be with you."

Sanji breathed out loudly into the phone. "What the hell is this, mushy confession time?" he asked, obviously trying to divert attention from how embarrassed he was.

"Nobody's stopping you from getting off on it."

"It was supposed to be dirty talk, not... whatever this is."

"Okay. Talk dirty to me then," Zoro said, laughing.

"God, you're the worst at phone seduction, I guess it _is_ all up to me."

"Go on."

"Now it's just awkward!" Sanji said.

"Fine, I'll start _again_. I'd really like it if you were here so we could fuck."

Sanji cackled down the phone, and Zoro laughed along. "I just miss your bed. Not even fucking in it, just how comfortable it is. I'm only getting off on the thought of laying in it right now."

Zoro laughed again. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Sanji said. His breath hitched in a gasp, and Zoro finally started to stroke himself again.

"I miss blowing you," Zoro said.

"I've been thinking about fucking you in the airport the whole time I've been over here," Sanji confessed. "You make really nice faces when you get fucked."

Zoro was silent, equal parts embarrassed and aroused that Sanji thought that way.

But Sanji barely even skipped a beat as he continued. "You start blushing and you try to look all annoyed but it's pretty obvious you like it."

Zoro bit his lip, squeezing hard around the base of his cock to keep himself from coming. Now that Sanji was talking about it, he couldn't do anything but think about it, about how much he _did_ like it, and how much he wouldn't mind a bit if Sanji were here right now to do it again.

"And you're so tight," Sanji said, his voice almost hoarse. "It feels so good. But I like it when you fuck me, too."

"Any time you want it, it'd be my pleasure," said Zoro.

Sanji laughed softly, and it was an intimate sound in the darkness of the room. "Who needs porn on demand when you can get fucked on demand?"

Zoro grunted in reply, back to fisting his cock.

"Are you close?" Sanji asked.

"Yeah," Zoro said, a little breathless.

"Me too."

They got distracted from keeping a coherent dialogue as they worked themselves to completion, Sanji first, then Zoro a couple minutes after, and the only soundtrack was stifled groans and frantic breathing that cut off at the apex.

"Next time we should do a video call or something," Sanji said once his breath had finally evened out.

"No way."

Sanji's laugh crackled over the phone. "What the hell is the point of technology if you can't use it to get long-distance laid?"

"We just had phone sex," Zoro pointed out. "I think you've gotten enough."

"It's not the same if I can't see you though."

"You're so fucking greedy, aren't you?" Zoro asked. He idly kicked at the blanket which had worked itself into a tangle around his sweaty legs, though it kept clinging to him instead of falling down.

"Nothing wrong with wanting to know you're there," Sanji said.

"You can hear me."

"But how do I know that you weren't doing something else? You could have been reading a book or watching TV on mute or something..."

"Wow, you're annoying. I wasn't doing anything but getting off with you."

"Maybe I'd just like it _better_ if I could see you," Sanji said.

"Too damn bad. You can see me when you get home."

Sanji yawned loudly. "I miss you though."

"I miss you too, but you'll be back soon," said Zoro. He glanced at the clock, noting that it was only seven, and that he couldn't just go to sleep on the phone while pretending that Sanji was close.

"Not soon enough."

"You weren't obligated to go," Zoro pointed out.

"No, I wanted to go, but it's hard to fall asleep when you're not within a couple miles of me. I don't like not being able to see you whenever I want to."

Zoro felt somewhat smug about that, but he didn't let on. "Two more days. You can make it."

Sanji hummed softly in his ear, then was silent. Zoro waited and waited for him to say something, until he realized that the soft breathing he heard wasn't actually himself, but Sanji having fallen asleep.

He smiled, staying on the line for just a few minutes longer, needing the comfort of hearing Sanji, then whispered a goodnight before hanging up.

* * *

The weekend was stressful, but mostly only because it didn't seem to pass anywhere near fast enough for Zoro's liking. He and Tashigi could do nothing but work on other cases on Saturday, since the search warrant wouldn't be approved until the beginning of next week at the earliest. It seemed to drag and drag, and when Tashigi asked him if he wanted to grab dinner, he was almost rude in how quickly he turned her down.

And Sunday he became even more jittery, because Sanji would finally be back home. He was so anxious to see him that he arrived at the airport nearly an hour early, and sat crosslegged on the floor against a window to wait, watching the clock flip over until his eyes began to feel heavy.

He refused to sleep though, even if it would make the time pass more quickly, and when the clock finally showed the arrival time of 6PM, he stood up and began to pace back and forth. Five minutes passed, then ten, then half an hour, and he bit his lip, feeling far too antsy. And then people started to pour out into the terminal.

No Sanji, though, no matter where he looked. Just a lot of nameless, faceless people that he didn't care about. He tapped his foot impatiently as the trickle of people died down and resurged yet again.

Finally, Sanji's blond head bobbed out from the mass of shorter, darker-haired people, and Zoro's heart leapt from excitement. He didn't even feel annoyed at it; he could only stand in place as Sanji got closer and closer, then came to a stop in front of Zoro.

He looked almost exactly the same as he had when he'd left - eyes a little tired, clothes plainer than normal, but smiling. His hair though... Zoro wasn't sure if it had actually gotten that long over the course of five days, or if he somehow hadn't noticed how long it was getting before Sanji left, and it had only just occurred to him. He reached out and tugged on a strand. "Time to get this cut, maybe," he said.

Sanji's smile grew even wider, and he dropped his bags to fling his arms around Zoro. "Shut up. I missed you too."

Zoro wrapped his arms around Sanji's waist, holding on for dear life, and buried his face in that sweet-smelling hair. They swayed together for a minute or two, entirely content to be together again, and when they separated, Zoro wasted no time in taking up Sanji's bags and leading him out to the lane of cabs. Once they'd loaded one up with baggage and slid in, Zoro pointed the driver toward his house, and within minutes, Sanji was out cold, leaning across the seat so that his head just barely rested on Zoro's upper arm.

He almost didn't want to wake Sanji when they arrived home a while later, but he did so with a few harsh shakes until Sanji sleepily slid out of the car. Meanwhile Zoro gathered up the luggage and balanced it all under one arm, and steadied Sanji up the stairs with the other. Inside, he dropped the suitcase and carry-on, and guided Sanji down the hallway to the living room.

"Mph. I'm awake," Sanji muttered when Zoro laid him down on the couch.

"Go to sleep," Zoro said.

"No, I have to fix my sleeping schedule."

"You can do that later, just sleep for now."

Sanji made a grumpy noise and sat up, then began to bustle around the house, putting chili on the stove for dinner, getting his suitcase upstairs, and tossing a few necessities into the washer for the next day's wear. He managed to stay awake until ten, and there Zoro drew the line and led him up the stairs.

They were in bed, just on the verge of sleep, when Sanji rested his face on Zoro's bare shoulder. "I missed you," he mumbled. It seemed like he could hardly stop saying it, and Zoro knew the feeling.

"I missed you too. I'm glad you're back."

Sanji's lips pressed against his skin in a kiss, and even when he started to drool later on, Zoro didn't feel anything but affection.

* * *

For the next week, they saw each other almost less than they had the previous week, if that was possible. Sanji was signed on for seven days of work to make up for those he'd missed, and Zoro was spending his time preparing for every possibility as they awaited the approval of the warrant.

Even when he wasn't working, he was stuck in the mindset of constantly being ready for action. Most nights he paced the house after dinner, a habit that wasn't even broken by texts or calls from Sanji. It only calmed when the warrant got back to the station Wednesday evening, and he found himself suddenly cursing the fact that the next day was his day off. Smoker and Tashigi had assured him that they'd keep him updated, and if backup was needed, he'd be the first one they called.

But it was frustrating all the same. All this buildup, all the work he'd done, and he wasn't even going to be there to see it actually go down. It was selfish, and bloodthirsty, and the part of him that was rational condemned the idea that he could be this way, but acknowledged it existed anyway.

He was too wired by adrenaline to sleep that night, but no matter what he did, nothing took that nervous energy away. Finally, he gave in and checked the hidden compartment in his desk, making sure his gun was inside just in case he got called in and couldn't stop by the station first. And what he saw - or rather didn't see - made him pause, eyes growing wide in horror.

The most important scrap of paper that he'd ever owned was gone. It was only a name and a phone number, but that was more than enough to bring the entire operation down around their ears.

He was quick about booting his laptop up, shooting off an email as fast as his fingers could type it: ' _Friday, 7AM, St. Michael's in Flushing._ ' There was no answer that night or the next morning, but he hadn't expected there to be.

Still, it didn't stop him from checking for one almost constantly during the birthday lunch he was treating Robin (and consequently, Franky) to. They did some catching up, a bit of talking business, updates of mutual friends, and parted ways an hour later, Zoro's wallet significantly lighter with the cost of all their meals plus all booze consumed which, when it came to them, was plentiful. And the whole time, he'd found himself thinking about all the things that were probably going wrong right at that very moment, all because he hadn't kept a tighter hold on that scrap of paper.

Too early on Friday morning, he dragged himself out to his destination. The church contained only a scattering of people, among them the man he was looking for. Black curls fell loose across his shoulders, shushing across the fabric as he tilted his head incrementally in greeting when Zoro sat down beside him. "Roronoa," he said in his deep, almost monotonous voice.

"Lucci," Zoro replied.

"Is there a reason you called me out?"

Zoro sat back, the wood of the pew uncomfortable on every surface. No matter how he positioned himself, it was awful, so he just stopped moving. "We might have to abort mission."

Lucci laughed, a menacing sound. "And why is that?"

"Your contact information is missing."

"I wouldn't worry too much if I were you," Lucci said with another low noise of amusement. "I know who took it. They've already spoken to me."

Zoro pressed his lips together tightly. "Who?"

"Like I said, I wouldn't worry about it," Lucci replied. "Oh... and I might try to keep a closer eye on what my friends are up to if I were you. Especially that boyfriend of yours."

"Was it him?" Zoro asked frantically as Lucci stood up, mind reeling at the idea that Sanji could have done this.

"No. He doesn't know we exist yet, so don't worry your little head. We've got it under control," Lucci said, brushing past Zoro into the aisle and heading for the doors.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Zoro called after him, but he'd already disappeared.

* * *

It wasn't until that afternoon that Zoro remembered Valentine's Day was exactly a week away. He found that he had no clue where to take Sanji, and eventually he'd given up and called Sanji to stealthily fish around for an idea.

"If you're trying to figure out where to take me for next Friday, you can stop," Sanji laughed over the phone.

For a moment, Zoro had gone quiet, cringing at himself. Had he finally gone over the edge? Maybe Sanji had an aversion to Valentine's Day? It wasn't like Zoro really _wanted_ to celebrate it himself, but he'd though Sanji would have.

"I thought I'd make dinner for us," Sanji plowed on. "That way you don't have to go through the embarrassment of taking me out for Valentine's Day."

Zoro sighed in relief. "Yeah, nothing worse than being seen with a catch like you."

"Aw, you think I'm a catch?" Sanji asked, and Zoro could almost imagine him batting his eyelashes playfully.

However, he refused to rise to Sanji's bait. "Are you sure you want to cook after work though? I don't mind if you want to go out."

"Eh. It'd be just as much work to go out as it'd be to stay in and cook. I don't mind."

"Hm, alright. You don't want like, flowers or chocolate or anything, do you?"

Sanji laughed. "Nah. Although I wouldn't say no if you wanted to bring me chocolate strawberries or something."

"I guess that can be arranged," Zoro said.

"Okay. Good. I have to go now, break's over."

"Alright. Have fun with work. I like you."

"Yeah. I like you too, asshole. Bye."

"Bye."

* * *

When Zoro got in to work on Saturday, he could immediately tell something was off. Tashigi took one look up at him when he came into the station and he knew that she would have given anything for him to have been the one to make the arrest.

"How was it?" he asked, coming to a stop by her desk.

"Disgusting," she said, face wrinkling up as if she'd smelled something bad. "The whole basement was full of dismantled corpses and organs, it was just _awful_."

"I would have gone for you if you'd wanted me to."

"It was gross, but it had to be done," she replied, awful look being replaced by one of determination. "So I did it. Or, well, kind of."

"Kind of?"

"There was an FBI agent there, she took care of a lot of it."

"Okay..." he said, confused over why the FBI needed to get involved with this. "Got an arrest report yet?"

"Yep. I'll make a copy for you and bring it back in a couple minutes, gotta finish something up first," Tashigi said. Her cheeks suddenly flushed, and Zoro dropped his hand from the strap of his backpack, leaning closer.

" _Something_?"

"It's _nothing_ ," she said, hands tightening around her phone, which chose that moment to ping with a text message.

He nodded and started to walk away, but just when Tashigi relaxed her hands on the phone, he doubled back and snatched it from her.

It was a text from Lieutenant Bellemere of all people, and he paused, confused.

Tashigi leapt for him while he was still wondering what the hell was going on, and grabbed it back, face bright red. "You asshole!" she said, smacking him on the arm.

He chuckled and patted her on the head. "Engaging with your superiors?"

She made a wild noise and smacked him again. "Go away!"

Zoro did, but he laughed all the way back to his office, though there was no malice in it. From the very beginning, Tashigi had been something like a little sister to him (even if she was older), and he treated her in a very similar way as Kuina treated him - teasing, but also caring. Tough love, as Kuina called it, and it worked well for them. She was good to have around.

About half an hour later, Tashigi brought him the report, and he felt himself grimacing as he read it, even as strong as his stomach was. It sounded gruesome, and the photos that came with it were just as bad.

It was forty-five minutes of reading, and though there were lots of details and asides to look at, it was mostly the nauseous feeling settled in his stomach that had him stopping and starting. When he finally finished it, he understood why Tashigi had been so disgusted.

Hogback had been up to exactly what they thought he'd been up to. And lucky for them, he was so full of himself that he thought he'd never get caught, which made Zoro want to laugh considering he left so much shit laying around for them to find him with. It was almost amateur, which made little sense considering he'd been at it for at least forty years. Had no one honestly noticed this before now? Or was it a case of the higher-ups looking the other way?

He tried to ignore that nagging feeling in the pit of his stomach, because an astonishing amount of luck had come with this arrest. For all the corpses lying around Hogback's basement - including Cindry's - there was even more correspondence, specifically to a man named Gekko Moriah, who they strongly suspected to be the Shadowcutter.

And Tashigi had left him a post-it note on the final page, saying that the mystery FBI agent was taking care of the situation, and that they'd be looking more deeply into it. It was a polite way of saying that this was no longer their business, and he sighed, feeling ever more unsatisfied.

He went home feeling utterly exhausted that night, and sat down on the couch with one of the bottles of absinthe Sanji had brought back from France. And he hadn't even finished a quarter of it before he'd fallen asleep right there, and slept the whole night through, albeit fitfully.

* * *

It wasn't just that night that was bad. There were nightmares nearly every single time he fell asleep for the following week. Zoro knew why, but he didn't want to acknowledge the fact that a woman he hadn't even known was enough to bring painful memories of the worst moment of his life rushing back.

Each night he'd awoken with the lingering image of Kuina in his mind, lying still and comatose in a hospital bed. And every night he had that dream, he'd called her, and she'd been patient and kind even when he couldn't say anything, just needing the comfort of hearing her voice.

When he called yet again, early in the morning on Valentine's Day, she finally caved and asked, though it was clear that she didn't want to upset him. "Is everything alright?"

Zoro was quiet for a few more seconds before answering. "No. We had a case... this woman had a traumatic brain injury but she survived. She killed herself."

Kuina made a dismissive noise in his ear. "You know I'm fine, right? I'm good now. I lived, and if I have any say it, I'm going to keep living as long as I can. You still have to defeat me, right?"

Zoro knew she was trying to lighten the mood, but it didn't really work, not when he was like this. "Yeah. Still gotta do that."

"Listen. I know that you still worry about it, but the doctor says I'm doing great. Unless something like that happens again, I'll keep being okay. Just remember that, yeah?"

"Yeah," he said.

"Okay. I'm gonna let you go, I have class in a couple hours."

"Yeah," he repeated. "Sorry for bothering you."

"Zoro... You're not bothering me, you know? This isn't something you can help. As much as I wish you didn't have to think about this all the time, I don't think less of you for still worrying. I just want to help."

"Okay. Bye," he said, and hung up before she could even reply.

It seemed ridiculous to him. She had been the one whose life was overthrown, but she'd gotten over it. And here he was, still thinking about it, still dreaming about it, even when she was alright. It still disrupted his life, but she had moved on. He had no right, and it felt selfish to keep reminding her. But he couldn't forget, no matter how hard he worked to. The guilt was just too overpowering.

He got out of bed, and even as exhausted as his body had already been from practicing before he'd gone to bed, he went through each kata again. He made his form as perfect as he could, blades poised straight and steady, muscles strained into place, head held high. And when he was done, he collapsed on the tatami and finally slept, utterly dreamless.

Of course he awoke later on with a sore back and marks from the tatami in his skin. His mouth and eyes were both dry, and he sat up slowly, feeling around for his phone in the darkness, but it was nowhere to be found. He stood and wobbled tiredly down the hall to his bedroom, where the glow of the clock showed him that his phone was laying on the nightstand, as well as informing him that it was 5AM. He decided that he might as well stay awake, and went to take a shower before work.

It was only mildly refreshing, but feeling just that tiny bit better was good enough for him.

An hour later, he walked into work feeling like the day could be alright after all, and Tashigi smiled at him as if to encourage him. "Any plans today?" she asked politely.

"Dinner at Sanji's," he grunted.

"That sounds nice," she said. "You deserve a break after how busy you've been these past couple weeks."

"You do too," he pointed out. "You worked just as hard."

"But you're the one who isn't getting any sleep," she said, and he narrowed his eyes at her. For how clumsy and air-headed she sometimes was, she was incredibly observant at the worst of times, and in those moments, she tended to treat him exactly the way Kuina did.

He was about to snap back at her, but was interrupted by a secretary coming to a stop beside him and placing a huge vase containing a dozen red roses on Tashigi's desk.

Zoro leaned forward, demeanor taking a 180 to smug. "Who's it from?" he asked.

Tashigi felt around on her head for her glasses, though they weren't there. Zoro picked them off of the desk and handed them to her. "Thanks," she murmured as she slid them on, face already red. She removed the little envelope from the clip, pulling out the card inside, and if it were at all possible, her face became even more red.

" _Who's it from?_ " Zoro persisted.

"Er," she said, clearing her throat. "Just a secret admirer!"

Zoro leaned over and snatched it from her hand, reading quickly.

_To Tash_

_From B_

_See you tonight, cutie!_

"What's so bad about that?" Zoro asked, almost disappointed that he couldn't get more dirt on her.

"It's nothing!" Tashigi said, so loudly it was nearly a shout, and she pulled it from his hand. "Go do your job!"

He moved on after a few shoves from Tashigi, and much like the rest of the office, spent the majority of his day taking it easy. Surprisingly, even Smoker wasn't working as hard as usual, and after lunch, he wandered into Zoro's office, closing the door behind himself.

Zoro glanced up from his phone, where he'd been texting with Franky, and waved off a two-fingered salute.

"The hell are you doing?" Smoker asked, sitting down on the chair in front of Zoro's desk.

"Nothing," Zoro replied.

"You're fired."

Zoro chuckled, putting his phone down. "Shouldn't it be a good thing that nothing is happening?"

Smoker grunted and kicked his feet up on the desk. "Yeah. Still feels kinda like we're just waitin' for somethin' to happen though."

"I know. Better to be on our toes though."

They sat in a companionable silence for a couple minutes before Smoker finally cleared his throat and spoke again. "Plans for tonight?"

Zoro glanced up from where he'd been eying a smudge of marker on his desk. "Uh, yeah. Dinner. Why the hell is everybody so concerned with my plans for tonight?"

Smoker scratched at the white stubble growing in on his cheeks. "Just curious."

"Do _you_ have any plans?" Zoro asked, not really expecting any kind of answer.

Smoker got a pinched look around his face, and didn't respond.

"Oh holy hell, you _do_ ," Zoro said, fighting not to gape.

"It's just a test," said Smoker. "Just trying somethin' new out."

Zoro fought not to say that it was an awfully big deal that he was even _trying_ something. It was a bigger feat to pull that man away from his job than it was to climb Mount Everest, and it probably took longer too.

"Stop lookin' at me like that," Smoker said, and when Zoro didn't, he stood and left the room, slamming the door behind himself.

Zoro laughed under his breath, shaking his head. He hoped that whatever this _test_ was, it would work out for Smoker.

* * *

Sanji's apartment smelled like heaven, especially since Zoro had just gotten off of a subway crammed with people, some of whom didn't seem to know proper hygiene protocols. He'd spent an hour and a half riding out to Manhattan, getting chocolate-covered strawberries and an extra box of cake truffles from Godiva just for Sanji, then riding back, and he was tired, annoyed, and hungry. He had to force himself to bypass the kitchen on the way to the bedroom, where he changed out of his uniform and into a pair of jeans and a deep green, slowly-unraveling sweater that Kuina had gotten him a couple years ago.

When he was done, he stepped into the kitchen and put the box of strawberries in the fridge, and Sanji called out to him from the dining room, so he moved inside, eager to get at the food.

Then he paused.

There were lit candles on the table along with the plates, and the lights were dimmed, just barely bright enough for him to see by. Sanji was carefully arranging scalloped potatoes on each plate, and Zoro was glad to see that he wasn't dressed up either, just wearing an old pullover hoodie that Zoro must have left there at some point, and a pair of dress pants that he clearly recognized as 'work pants.'

He must have made some kind of face, because Sanji laughed as he stepped away from the plates. "Humor me, yeah?"

Zoro grunted and leaned in for a quick greeting kiss, which turned into more of an unhurried meeting of tongues that ended only when Sanji pressed a hand against his chest and stepped back.

They sat down, Zoro eyeballing all the food - bacon-wrapped filet mignon, scalloped potatoes, green beans with bacon, and rolls. To the side, there was a lowball glass with a couple fingers worth of the Chartreuse Sanji had brought back from France. He picked up his fork and knife, ready to dig in.

"Hold on," Sanji said. "Don't you have anything to say first?"

"Uh," said Zoro. "Thanks for this meal?"

"No."

"Hm... Happy Valentine's Day?"

"Nope."

"What the hell am I supposed to say?"

"You're _supposed_ to ask me if I'll be your valentine."

"What the hell is this, kindergarten?"

" _Ask me_."

Zoro grumbled and griped, but finally he gave in. "Will you be my valentine?"

"No! I just wanted to hear you say it!" Sanji crowed gleefully, picking up his own knife and fork before cutting into the filet mignon.

"You're such a shithead," Zoro muttered, and dug in.

As they ate, he was more observant of Sanji than he usually was. He was worried, despite Lucci telling him not to be, and every move was analyzed to its highest degree. Still, he saw nothing that he should be suspicious of, no reason why he should have been keeping a _closer eye_ on him like Lucci had said. Sanji was just _Sanji_. Nothing stood out about him except for every little thing, because that's just what Zoro looked for in him. He wanted to know him and memorize every little detail, so it all stood out equally as much.

And there was nothing in the conversation that told him anything was out of the ordinary. It was mostly a discussion of Tennessee Williams and Sanji relating a little bit more of his trip in France. All of it was so _normal_ for them, and he was convinced that Lucci had been fucking with him.

When they finished eating, the candles were blown out and the dishes were rinsed and put in the dishwasher. Sanji collected the strawberries and a bottle of champagne from the fridge, along with two glasses, then they headed back into the bedroom, where Sanji quickly decided he wanted to take a bath.

And so that's what they did. In the bathroom, they divested themselves of clothes while water ran into the tub, and then took a few moments trying to figure out how they'd arrange themselves in it.

With a lot of pushing and shoving, Zoro finally ended up with his back to the edge of the tub, Sanji between his legs and leaned up against his chest. It was kind of uncomfortable, with both of their feet having to rest on the far edge of the tub, but Zoro kept his mouth shut, because there was no reason to complain about Sanji being this close to him.

"It's a good thing we're not doing this in your bathtub," Sanji said as he picked up the bottle of champagne and started to peel off the foil.

"My bathtub is great," Zoro protested. The clawfoot slipper tub hadn't been something he was overwhelmingly wowed by when he'd bought the house, but after spending many a night in it after work or a tiring practice, he'd decided it was one of the best things about the place.

"Yeah, it's very stylish," Sanji said. "It's just lucky we can both fit in there for a shower at the same time."

Zoro nudged his fingers into Sanji's slippery sides. "Sorry, I guess I wasn't considerate of the fact that maybe I'd want to have a party in my bathroom someday."

"Easy mistake," Sanji said, and pressed his thumb to the cork. The next thing Zoro knew, it had shot across the bath and cracked one of the tiles.

"Oops," Sanji chuckled as the champagne frothed and some of it spilled out into the bathtub.

"Good job," said Zoro sarcastically.

"Yeah, yeah. Hand me the flutes, would you?"

Zoro reached out and grabbed the glasses off the floor, placing them on the rim of the tub so Sanji could pour champagne into them.

When they were settled with a glass of champagne apiece and the box of strawberries sitting beside the half-empty bottle on the rim of the tub, Sanji finally leaned back and let his full weight fall on Zoro.

"For such a skinny bastard, you sure do weigh a lot," Zoro grunted.

"Muscle weighs more than fat."

"What muscle?"

Sanji made a noise of outrage, and sat forward only to sit immediately back again, so that the movement of his body caused a tidal wave of water to splash against Zoro's face.

Zoro sputtered. "The hell was that for?"

"For pissing me off! Don't you want me to have a good Valentine's Day?"

For a moment, Zoro had to wonder if this was the first time Sanji had actually spent Valentine's Day with someone, but that seemed so incredibly unlikely that he had to ask instead of assuming. "You've had one before though, haven't you?"

"Of course. Almost every single year of my life, what kind of loser do you think I am?" Sanji scoffed.

Zoro wrapped his arms low around Sanji's waist, fingers brushing lightly over the trail of hair leading downward from his belly button. Sometimes it seemed to him like Sanji hated being alone more than anything in the world, but he couldn't reconcile that image with the Sanji who was just as pleased to stand alone in the kitchen, peeling potatoes or baking a cake, though it wasn't like he was perfectly alone in those moments either; Zoro was always close by.

"What are you thinking about?" Sanji asked neutrally, breaking him from his thoughts. He had his glass of champagne in one hand and a half-eaten strawberry in the other, and Zoro couldn't see his expression from behind, which made him unsure of what to say.

"You."

"I'm right here," said Sanji.

"Yeah, I know."

Zoro gulped down his whole glass of champagne, then put it back on the edge of the tub. "Your birthday is soon," he said, seemingly out of the blue.

"Yup. Getting old."

"You're already old," Zoro laughed.

"Hey! I'll be the same age as you for a little while, are you saying _you're_ old too?"

"Nope, you're the one that always calls me old."

Sanji pinched Zoro hard on the thigh, and Zoro pinched him on the back, which quickly escalated to some kicking and jabbing with elbows, and when they finally settled again, Zoro was content to stroke his fingers over Sanji's skin. There wasn't a lot of it that he could reach which wasn't covered in ink, though that was fine. He dragged his knuckles up and down Sanji's left arm, until goosebumps raised on his skin and he shivered.

"Stop that," Sanji said.

Zoro did, letting his hand come to rest on Sanji's stomach again.

They were quiet, the water steadily going lukewarm. Then Sanji turned to face Zoro with much splashing, and they were finally face-to-face.

"Hey," Zoro said.

"Hi." Sanji leaned in and slid his lips against Zoro's, a flutter of a kiss that became more aggressive with time. Zoro's hands came up to tangle in Sanji's hair, and Sanji's rested on Zoro's shoulders as he floated into Zoro's lap.

"What's up?" Zoro asked, holding back laughter as Sanji's lips pressed to the ticklish join between his shoulder and neck.

"You know. Hanging out," replied Sanji. His lips had migrated down to Zoro's chest, teeth scraping over the skin there. "Wanna fuck?"

Zoro gave in and let out a laugh, though this one was at Sanji's joking brashness. "I dunno. Do you?"

"I could go for it," Sanji said. His bright blue eyes turned up to look at Zoro, and Zoro's skimmed down his body in turn. A couple bubbles clung to his wet skin, but Zoro's main point of focus was his hardening cock.

"I can't wait until you're not a teenager with a boner problem anymore," Zoro said, reaching a hand down to wrap around Sanji's cock and giving it a few easy jerks.

"I'm not a teenager, and I don't have a boner problem. You just seem not to realize that you're not half bad to look at." Sanji shifted his legs, trying to fit his thighs in between Zoro and the bathtub, though it wasn't working at all. He moaned, stilling as his head dropping forward when Zoro's grip tightened on his cock.

"That's not even a good excuse," Zoro said. He had to admit though, having Sanji wet and rubbing up against him was definitely doing things for his own boner problem. "You wanna go get a condom and some lube?"

Sanji grunted, pushing his hips up into Zoro's hold. "In a second."

"Now."

"I don't like delayed gratification," Sanji complained as he stood up, water cascading off of him.

"If you want instant gratification, you're not going to get fucked," Zoro said, watching as Sanji leaned out of the tub and put one arm against the sink to hold himself up, rummaging inside one of the cabinets with the other. He came up a moment later with a bottle of lube and a condom, and sat back down in the bathtub.

"Here," he said, passing the condom to Zoro, as he popped open the bottle and slicked up his fingers, instantly going to work on opening himself up.

"Why the hell do you keep condoms and lube in your bathroom?"

Sanji shrugged. "They're all over the apartment if you know where to look."

"That's a little scary," said Zoro, tearing open the foil packet to roll the condom onto his cock and slick it up with a little bit of shoving Sanji out of the way.

"I've had a lot of sex in my life, Zoro," Sanji said, gripping Zoro's shoulder as he positioned himself. "You were the first one to get to me in a lot of ways, but not this one. I'm not going to apologize for that."

"I'm not going to ask you to," said Zoro, gritting his teeth as Sanji started to work himself down.

It was probably the messiest sex that Zoro had ever had, if only for the fact that every time Sanji rose and fell, more water splashed out of the tub. One wave even managed to catch both their empty champagne flutes and send them to the floor with a tinkle of glass breaking. Sanji didn't pay it any mind, but after another minute of fucking himself, he pulled up to stand and shook his head. "This isn't going to work." He took a long moment to survey the tub, and finally nudged Zoro with his foot. "Stand up."

"I'm not going to fuck you standing up in the shower," Zoro said.

"No, just stand up. I know how we can do this."

Zoro stood reluctantly and watched as Sanji went down to his knees, leaning forward to rest his arms on the upper edge of the bathtub so that he was basically on all fours. "Doggy style?" he asked dubiously.

Sanji turned his head and cut his eyes upward. "I thought I asked you to humor me tonight?"

With a sigh, Zoro conceded and sank to his knees. With a little bit of readjusting, he pressed into Sanji, and finally they could move together again.

It was less messy this way, though the water still sloshed around them, and it wasn't really a position that Zoro tended to prefer. He wasn't so sure how he felt about not being able to see Sanji's face while he fucked him; his ability to read body language was pretty much halved if he couldn't see expressions, so he had no idea what Sanji was feeling, if he was in pain or a state of neutrality or pleasure.

Still, it was... interesting. From this point, he saw an entirely different part of Sanji than he usually did when they fucked. He was used to seeing Sanji's face, his cock, his stomach muscles jumping as his body clenched. But this way, he could see the elegant nape of Sanji's neck, ripe for the marking, and the shift of his spine and shoulders while he held himself up, and best of all, his ass, which Zoro didn't really need any excuse for - he just liked to look at it. And to be entirely fair, it was kind of arousing to be able to see himself breaching Sanji's body this way.

Sanji seemed to like it as well, turning his face out of the cover of his arms and letting out a quiet moan. Zoro could finally see enough of him to realize that he definitely wasn't feeling anything but pleasure, and it was enough for him to work Sanji over harder, pushing into that tight heat with quick, even strokes as Sanji pulled at his cock.

He came easily when Zoro found the proper spot to angle himself against with each thrust, and Zoro wasn't far after, not even trying to fight the slick pull of Sanji's body.

When they came to a stop and caught their breath, Zoro stripped off the condom and tossed it into the trashcan, and Sanji pulled himself back up. "Okay, we can safely say that this water is filthy now," he muttered to himself, then closed the curtain and flipped the water back on for a shower.

It was a quick one, both of their bodies and minds starting to droop after so much physical exertion and a long day before that, so they were remarkably efficient about washing up instead of groping.

When they were done, the bathroom still needed to be cleaned though. Almost everything was waterlogged and unsalvageable at this point, and Zoro was sort of impressed at the destruction they'd caused.

"Making a fucking mess out of my bathroom floor," Sanji grumbled, pushing a towel around with his foot and drinking from the bottle of champagne as Zoro picked up all the larger pieces of broken glass from the champagne flutes, then headed out to grab the broom and dustpan from the hallway closet to get the rest of it up.

Navigating around the small bathroom together was somewhat difficult, but they finally managed to get it all tidied up and moved into the bedroom to dry themselves off. Zoro was basically done after that, tossing the towel to the floor and falling into the bed, all while Sanji made a sour face at him.

"I don't get how you can sleep naked and be comfortable," he said.

"Sleeping naked is the best," Zoro replied with a yawn.

Sanji looked dubious, but after he'd tossed his towel in the laundry basket, he stepped toward the bed instead of the dresser.

They lay together, intentionally skin to skin outside of sex like they so rarely did, and while Sanji seemed slightly uncomfortable at first, he slowly relaxed into Zoro.

And Zoro stroked his fingers down Sanji's bare side, meeting no resistance. It felt like they were being honest, in a strange way. His shoulders felt less weighted already. It had been a good day, despite everything.


	11. Birthday Cake

Sanji was sick. It was a fact that Zoro couldn't escape from, not when he had to listen to Sanji being congested over the phone all the time, and especially not with Sanji's self-inflicted quarantine that had kept Zoro from seeing him for the greater part of the week since Valentine's Day.

They were currently on the phone for the fourth time today, and Zoro hoped like hell that Sanji would never retire if he was this bothersome when he had nothing better to do. He wondered if he could just reach through and strangle Sanji. "Don't call me until you feel better," he said instead.

"'M fine. I don't even feel that awful," Sanji moaned, heaving in a loud sniffle. "I'm just _bored_."

"I'm not gonna fucking ask you again," said Zoro. " _Do you want me to come over._ "

"I don't want you to get sick."

Zoro contemplated hanging up on Sanji, and had to force himself to suck in a deep, calming breath. "I didn't ask if you wanted me to get sick or not, I asked if you wanted me to come over."

Sanji made a nasally humming noise, and finally sighed. "Yes."

"Okay, that's all you had to say. Do you want me to bring you anything?"

"Actually... could you stop by the store?" Sanji asked, suddenly all cheer. "I wanna make comfort food for myself, but I don't want to go."

Zoro finally gave in and made a loud noise of frustration, which caused Tashigi to pause in front of his open office door and give him a questioning look. "Yes. I'll stop by the store. Give me a list."

Sanji named off several specific ingredients, then asked for another bottle of Nyquil, and finally they hung up and Zoro could get back to work without worrying that Sanji was actually dying of boredom.

When he left the station at the end of the day, he stopped by the store and got everything that Sanji had asked for (spicy sausage, heavy cream, and several different kinds of vegetables), plus a six pack of beer for himself, then headed over.

The first thing he realized upon entering the apartment was that it was kind of scaldingly hot. And though he'd assumed from the phone calls that Sanji would be laid up in bed trying to get better, he had been wrong, as the light in the kitchen was on, and he could hear Sanji banging around inside.

He frowned as he crossed the living room and came to a stop in the kitchen archway. "What the hell are you doing?"

Sanji looked up from where he was rolling together little mounds of potato, and shrugged. "Prep work," he said. In person, his voice was much more congested than Zoro had previously thought, and he had a dead look about him thanks to his sunken eyes, complemented by grayish bags underneath that only barely hid behind his glasses. On top of that, his hair hung unstyled around his face, sitting in loose, uncombed waves, and he hadn't bothered to dress himself decently at all, instead wearing a pair of sweatpants (which Zoro hadn't even thought he'd _owned_ ) and a sleeveless muscle shirt. He was a pitiful sight, frankly.

"Go sit down, I'll take care of this," said Zoro as he put down the grocery bags on the counter and began unloading them.

"You don't know how to make it," Sanji said, brows scrunched together.

At this point, Zoro was ready to pick him up, fireman's carry style, and haul him into the bedroom. There might or might not be handcuffs involved in the equation as well, and not in a sexy way. "Is it really that hard for you to just sit down and rest?"

"Not everyone is lazy all the time like you," said Sanji as he picked up a knife and began to slice the roll of potato something-or-other into small pieces. At the very least, his cooking seemed to be completely on par with a regular day, and he did it without really even focusing on it. "Besides, I slept all morning. I can't sleep anymore."

To a person like Zoro, that sentence made absolutely no sense. There was _always_ room in him for a nap. And though he knew that Sanji was kind of a busybody, Zoro had at least assumed that he'd try to take care of himself. "It'll slow down your recovery," he warned.

"I have the weekend to recover."

"Will you please just go and lay down?"

"Nope," said Sanji as he finished chopping up the dough and moved on to washing and coring habanero peppers over the sink.

They were both incredibly stubborn people when it came down to it, Zoro knew. Sanji relented easily sometimes, but if he got his mind fixed on something, he wouldn't let go. Like a tick. Zoro grimaced, knowing that this was one battle he was going to have to back down from. "Fine. What can I do to help you then?"

"Put a sautépan on and cut the carrots into half-moons?"

Zoro got to it, and for a while, he and Sanji worked together in silence. When they'd gotten their respective piles of carrots, onions, celery, and peppers chopped up, it all got tossed into the sauté pan with crumbles of spicy sausage. Then Sanji supervised as Zoro pushed the mixture around in the pan, occasionally reaching around his waist to take his hand, guiding it through the motions of moving things efficiently so that they didn't overcook.

It was kind of bizarre. Zoro didn't know if Sanji was feeling restless and wanted to be the one in charge of everything, or if he was actually trying to let Zoro do most of it, only interfering when he saw the need for it. All the same, Zoro was glad that the fevered heat of Sanji's body was pressed against his back, leading him through the process of cooking, because it meant he could monitor Sanji's condition more easily.

Once Sanji deemed it ready, they dumped the sautédmixture into the gently-simmering stock pot, along with several different kinds of seasonings and a couple bags of peas and corn, and put the lid on, and Zoro finally saw his chance to hustle Sanji toward the couch.

For an hour or so, they let the soup simmer, Zoro only standing occasionally to stir it or to pour the carton of cream in. That entire time, he forced Sanji not to move from the couch, only allowing him up to boil the gnocchi. Still, that only took ten minutes, and soon they were sitting back down on the couch with full bowls of spicy sausage and gnocchi soup, which they both devoured as quickly as they could. Sanji even went back for seconds at one point, which he rarely ever did.

"I feel so much better now," he groaned, patting his stomach once he'd put his empty bowl on the coffee table.

Zoro understood; a single bite of the soup had been hot enough to make his own sinuses feel perfectly clear, after all. "You still need to be resting."

"Are you my fucking mom or something?"

"I sure hope not," said Zoro darkly.

Sanji coughed out a laugh and slid up the couch, laying his head contentedly in Zoro's lap. There was a slight sheen of sweat on his forehead, and he still looked a little pale, but it _did_ seem like he was feeling a bit better.

"You're lucky I have another bottle of beer here," Zoro said, putting down the one he'd just emptied on the side table.

"Why's that?"

"I'd push you off to get more."

"Why do I like you again?"

"Don't know."

"Neither do I. You know what really sucks the most about being sick?"

"Hm?"

"Feeling so awful that you can't even think about sex without feeling like death."

Zoro laughed, petting Sanji's hair back. "I thought you said you didn't feel that bad."

"I lied. This is the true sign of illness."

"Okay. Let me call Chopper and ask him what to do if your need to have sex is suddenly destroyed," said Zoro, with no intention behind his words.

"He would probably hang up on you," Sanji said, smiling. He shifted upward, so that his head slid further into the dip of Zoro's thighs, and Zoro placed a hand down on his chest, which was slowly rising and falling.

"Probably."

Sanji said nothing in return, so Zoro laid his head against the back of the sofa and closed his eyes, but didn't sleep. At some point, Sanji shifted, sniffling and letting out a cough as he pulled the throw blanket over his legs, then settled again.

"What do you want to do for your birthday?" Zoro asked after a while, not even tipping his head up to look at Sanji.

"I don't know. Whatever you want to do," Sanji said sluggishly, as if he had been on the verge of falling asleep.

"You don't have to spend it with me, you know. If you want to do something with your dad or your friends or whatever..."

"No. I wanna spend it with you. Besides, Ace said we're going bar-hopping on Saturday, so we can do something on my birthday." Sanji paused and coughed hard, then let out a moan of pure, melodramatic suffering. "Assuming I'm not hungover. Actually, you should come with us. That way if I'm hungover, at least you'll be in the same boat."

"I'm not a lightweight like you," Zoro said, finally looking down at Sanji, who cracked an eye open to glare up at him.

"I might be sick, but I'm not too sick to break your mouth with my foot."

Zoro bared his teeth at Sanji in a challenging smile. "Try it. I'll toss your skinny ass out a window."

"Okay. Maybe I'll hit the ground hard enough that I can breathe again. Or maybe I'll die, then I won't have to worry about having a cold ever again," said Sanji.

"Don't joke about that."

He must have said it in a particularly serious manner, because Sanji's eyes opened and he bit his lip, seeming unsure. "I'm sorry."

Zoro felt his own face being drawn down into a frown, even if he didn't intend it to. He felt the sudden need to leave the room, but he forced himself to stay sitting, not willing to let it get to him.

Sanji coughed loudly before speaking again. "I... whatever I did. I didn't mean it."

"Don't worry about it," said Zoro, but he averted his gaze from Sanji's, and didn't put forth any effort to draw him into another conversation. He was more annoyed with himself than Sanji anyway, because his fucking _brain_ was so screwed up that he couldn't even joke with his boyfriend without turning it serious and imagining how awful it would be if Sanji _didn't_ die, if he had to suffer like Kuina had. Pointedly, he turned on the television, determined to make himself think of anything else.

Eventually Sanji fell asleep in his lap, mouth hanging open so he could breathe, and Zoro carried him into the bedroom. But he didn't join Sanji there. He sat out on the balcony in the cold night air, forcing his thoughts into silence for a long, long time before finally going to bed.

* * *

For the record, therapy was not something Zoro had voluntarily gone looking for. It had been Shakky who'd suggested it, and then Kuina had encouraged it, but it had taken him a long, _long_ time to be alright with the idea of needing help. He wasn't the kind of person who had severe enough problems to warrant therapy.

So he had thought. But as he got older, his ability to forget got worse instead of better, and by the time he was 26, Zoro found himself unable to think about anything but Kuina's accident during the day, and he couldn't escape from it in his dreams either. It was a vicious, never-ending cycle that disrupted his work, his relationships, and his ability to function, and it took nearly nine years of torture for him to give in and let Shakky recommend Dr. Beckman to him. By that point, he wasn't even _sure_ if his problems could be fixed.

Therapy wasn't a magical cure-all, not that he'd expected it to be. It didn't make the dreams go away, or make them immediately bearable. It didn't stop him from feeling guilty more often than not. And it took him months to figure out how to even talk about his feelings, let alone articulate them. Longer still to realize that he wasn't just confined to talking about the lingering thoughts of Kuina's accident, that he could talk about anything he wanted to, really.

At this point, for him, it was like paying for a friend. One who was completely nonjudgmental, exceptionally good at listening and giving advice, and whom Zoro didn't have to see anywhere but here. Most of the time, he could forget that Dr. Beckman even existed, if he wanted to.

Almost all of his sessions had normalized at some point over the past two years, to the point where he talked more often about the things in his life that had nothing to do with Kuina than the things that did. His new over-arching theme seemed to be Sanji, as Dr. Beckman had latched onto that topic with a kind of voracity that was almost worrying to Zoro. It must have been akin to picking at a scab for therapists, Zoro guessed. He'd found a childhood friend with whom Zoro had bad blood, and wanted to pick away at that concept until Zoro opened up and bled all the bad out.

"What about your relationship with Mr. Black?" Dr. Beckman began after they'd finished their set of opening questions and answers. "Is it stable?"

"Yeah. I guess so. We don't have actual fights much. It feels easy," Zoro said. It was true their relationship would seem a little off-kilter for some, but he liked the way they were. He liked messing with Sanji, and being messed with by Sanji. He liked the teasing and the play-fighting and the real fighting, the swords against legs fighting. He liked it when Sanji was soft and kind and he liked it when he was hard and mean. There wasn't a single thing he could think of that didn't feel _right_.

"You don't fight, but do you often feel anger toward him?"

"No. He's done bad things to me before but he's different now. Understanding, and a lot calmer."

"So time apart has been good for your relationship," Dr. Beckman said, then pulled out a cigarette from the packet sitting on the table beside his chair. "Do you mind?"

"Go ahead."

"Time apart has been good?" he prompted again, lighting the cigarette with a match and taking a deep inhale.

"I guess so. But there are parts of him I missed out on, and that bothers me."

"Why is that?"

"There's just times when I realize some of our friends know more about who he is now than I do," said Zoro, thinking of Ace. He took a sip of water and cleared his throat, then scratched his arm. It wasn't that he was uncomfortable, but Dr. Beckman always made him feel like he was being intensely scrutinized, every word examined deeply.

"Is that a bad thing?" Dr. Beckman asked. He took another draw from his cigarette, and let the smoke out of the corner of his mouth.

Zoro took a moment to figure out how to articulate himself, and when it came out it still wasn't exactly how he felt. "Maybe. I'm not entitled to know everything, but I want to."

"You learn about people as they feel comfortable sharing themselves. For instance, you haven't told him about your PTSD. Why is that?"

"It's not like I freak out over the accident that often anymore," said Zoro. He tore at the label on his water bottle, eyes diverted from Dr. Beckman's so that he wouldn't see the lie, and hoping that he couldn't hear it either.

"But it still affects you. Perhaps it's not present in day-to-day life but he'll eventually become privy to it. You don't think you should tell him ahead of time?"

"Can't I just play it by ear?"

"I think maybe you think it makes you seem weak, and that's the exact opposite of how you want to appear in his eyes," Dr. Beckman said. He put out the cigarette butt in the ashtray beside himself, and took a sip of coffee from his mug. "But you have to remember that the things that affect us don't always show on the outside. And perhaps he has just as many problems as you do, and taking the first step toward vulnerability would help you both."

Zoro shrugged. "He's a model of normality. I doubt he's anywhere near as fucked up as I am."

"I imagine everyone seems fairly normal to you."

"Why's that?"

"Surely it's not because you have deep-seated abandonment issues, a severely persistent case of PTSD, a massive guilt complex, a standing grudge against your father, whom you believe stopped caring the moment your mother died, and you're one drink away from becoming an alcoholic," Dr. Beckman said with a completely straight face. "Perhaps you spend so much time thinking about your own problems that you don't recognize the problems in others. I'm not saying you're self-involved, and it's very important to take care of yourself. But you shouldn't assume that everyone else is walking around in the world without a burden on their back just because your own overwhelms you."

"Any other psychoanalysis for me, doc?" Zoro asked, somewhat stung at how true that was.

"Of course. I think the only reason you enjoy your job is because it gives you a sense of power over anything at all. But you also grow to hate people more because of it, and in a way it frightens you. Drinking used to be your only way of coping with it, now you find refuge in Mr. Black too because he lets you get away with not talking about it, so you can forget for a while. You want to be doing something better in life. But you have no idea where else to take it."

"Now you're just jumping to conclusions."

"I wonder," said Dr. Beckman.

* * *

Between work, having to get back home, and meeting up with everyone else, the day before Sanji's birthday was chaotic. Luckily though, the last of his cold was gone, and he was fully prepared for a night of drinking, as evidenced by the greasy hamburgers and fries he'd been putting on plates when Zoro walked into the kitchen. He glanced up and smiled in greeting, and when Zoro came over to give him a kiss hello, he graciously turned his face to the side so Zoro could get at him a little easier.

"Hey," he said. "I figured we'd have time to eat before we left but you're a little later than I expected, so we'll have to hurry."

"Sorry. Tashigi needed help with something."

"I'm not mad," Sanji said. "Just kinda... ready to get this over with."

"You don't want to go?" Zoro asked as he pulled a couple bottles of water from the fridge. He passed one to Sanji before starting in on his burger.

Sanji uncapped the bottle and took a quick swig before speaking. "It's not that. Some of our friends just figure they may as well go all out if they're going to go at all."

Zoro didn't really have to guess who he meant. Ace and Luffy could escalate an incident quicker than you could snap your fingers, and Franky and Brook were nearly as good at it. "So everybody's going to be there?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"Hm. That's gonna take some maneuvering."

"Yeah. Hurry up and eat."

Zoro did so. It only took him about five minutes to clear his plate, where Sanji took a little longer considering he had to wipe his mouth after every single bite.

Finally though, they were out the door. It was perfect weather to walk in, the temperature having calmed down to a breezy 60 degrees in the past week, and considering that they were meeting the rest of the group only a couple blocks from Zoro's house, they took full advantage of the fact.

The light jacket that Sanji had shoved him into was really the only concession Zoro ever made to the changing of seasons. Sanji, however, had completely rotated his winter wardrobe out. His warm sweaters and cardigans had been exchanged for mid-arm henleys and long-sleeved button-ups with the cuffs turned up. Zoro was starting to develop a kind of Pavlovian response to the sight of Sanji's bare forearms, which were much stronger than he'd originally thought, and watching the veins of his wrists flex whenever he did something with his hands was almost mesmerizing. It didn't hurt that his tattoos were partially revealed on an almost full-time basis now, which sometimes made it hard for Zoro to look away.

They arrived to the first bar of the night later than they'd planned on. It was one of those quiet, nicely-decorated places that was owned by some young entrepreneur and patronized by equally young entrepreneurs who all thought they were living in the 50s. It was more like a lounge, really, and there were plenty of women with retro pincurls and faux-vintage cocktail dresses, and men with slicked-back hair and suspenders.

The only people who really fit in were Sanji, Brook, and Robin, and the rest of them stuck out like sore thumbs. Zoro didn't even know why they were at a place like this, unless Sanji had decided on it, because he was sure he wasn't imagining the strange looks they got from almost everyone else in the room.

Luckily, they didn't stay long. A few cocktails were had, enough to get the buzz going before they all became rather sick of having the stuck-up richies glaring at them, then they paid and headed down the block to their next destination.

The second bar was much more their style, with several different types of beer on tap along with classic, greasy bar food, and the jukebox was loaded with Queen, Springsteen, and The Who. They settled into a booth with a couple pitchers of beer and some baskets of cheese fries, and got down to business until most of them were tipsy enough to be led through a boisterous rendition of "Fat Bottomed Girls" (accompanied by the other patrons) that left Sanji blushing even as he laughed, and Zoro had to lean over and press a fond kiss to his mouth.

He wasn't sure if it was that exact moment that caused him to be blindsided by adoration for Sanji, or if it was just because they were a little buzzed and surrounded by their friends and it felt so good and right in that moment. But frankly, it didn't matter what the reason was, because he finally had Sanji back, and they were happy, and he could imagine spending the rest of his life like this.

"This feels right," Sanji murmured against Zoro's ear, his hair tickling Zoro's neck, bristly stubble scraping his cheek, and warm breath setting his earrings to clinking together.

Zoro had to wonder if Sanji had been reading his mind. "What does?"

"All of us together like this."

Zoro hummed in agreement, and took a long gulp of his beer. Rounds were being ordered one after the other, and there seemed to never be a lull without a drink. Some of them were taking better advantage of that fact than others, and it would only be a matter of time before it became a full-blown competition.

Sure enough, Luffy had a suggestion not even half an hour in. "We should play a drinking game!"

"Yeah? Like what?" asked Sanji.

"Drink every time Luffy mentions wanting to eat meat," somebody stage-whispered slyly.

"Every time Zoro and Sanji disappear into their own world," someone else suggested.

"Or we can drink every time somebody at this table wants their ass kicked," said Sanji.

"Whenever Brook starts singing," another voice chimed in.

"Every time somebody at this table feels like their masculinity is in danger," Nami said.

"Or every time Zoro drinks five beers to everyone else's two," said Brook.

"How about we take a drink every time I shove my sword down somebody's smartass throat."

"The only person who wants your _sword_ is Sanji," Brook said disdainfully.

"Every time someone at this table comes up with a bogus drinking game idea," a waitress chipped in as she passed by.

"Yeah, let's go with that one," they all agreed.

Of course, soon most of them had reached the stage where things slipped from their mind like water through fingers, and the drinking game was forgotten.

Sanji was on the edge of being among them. In all fairness, he was decent at holding his alcohol, but he was so skinny that it only took about four glasses of beer on top of the previous bar's cocktails to get him a little sloppy.

"You okay?" Zoro asked as Sanji nearly slipped off the edge of the booth laughing at something Ace had said. It was rather amusing to see how animated he was around others when he was a little drunk, as compared to how he became either sultry or sincere with Zoro.

"Yeah, fine," Sanji said. He grinned at Zoro, and almost had his head slammed face-first into the table when Luffy pushed him forward, trying to get out of the booth.

"Sorry!" he said as he pushed Zoro forward too. The next moment he was down and headed for the bathroom, flip-flops slapping noisily on the tile.

"That kid," sighed Franky.

"Like older brother, like younger brother," Nami agreed.

"Hey!" Ace's eyebrow was raised, clearly taking offense at this.

"It's kind of true."

Ace grumbled, but relented.

Luffy was back a few moments later, looking pleased with himself, and Zoro and Sanji scooted forward so that he could get back to his place beside Nami without any undue damage to themselves. It was probably too much to expect that Luffy would sit still and get back to drinking though, because he started squirming around and generally annoying everyone not even ten minutes later.

"I broke the seal," he kept groaning, and finally gave in and crawled over Zoro and Sanji once again, then wobbled toward the restrooms, accidentally opening the door to the women's room before doubling back for the men's. Nobody at the table felt even a little bit bad for laughing at him.

They stayed at the bar for an hour longer, letting the alcohol stagnate in their veins enough to get some of them a little more sober. By then, Chopper and Usopp had decided to call it a night, much to the complaint of Luffy, and the group slowly started gathering themselves together to leave.

"Where are we going next?" asked Ace, looking to Sanji for an answer.

"We should go dance," Franky interrupted, and a few people chipped in their agreement. It wasn't what Zoro would have picked, but Sanji didn't disagree (or agree) with it, and it was his birthday, so it was his choice.

But it seemed that his choice was entirely different, because he stayed still when everyone but he and Zoro had stood up. "You guys go ahead," he said. "We're gonna hang around here instead."

"Fine. We'll probably only stay for an hour or two, so let's meet up at Shakky's," said Nami.

"Alright."

They headed out the door, and he and Sanji were left alone. Though there were still many rowdy patrons throughout the room, it was almost too easy to ignore them when Sanji slid closer despite no longer needing to be tucked in tight.

"Wanna go back to your place for a quicky?" Sanji whispered in his ear.

"No."

"Wanna have a quicky in the bathroom?" he asked, undeterred.

"No."

"Would you like to have any kind of sex at all in the next month?"

"I'm not bothered by it, really," said Zoro, just to see Sanji puff up and turn red with annoyance. He realized they'd probably gotten past the honeymoon stage, and that they weren't both walking around on eggshells anymore. It was alright to be moody, or downright scathing with each other, and it was alright to be a little bit less than nice. Zoro was glad for that. It was kind of weird to see Sanji fighting so hard against his own nature of sarcasm and tough affection. By definition, he wasn't a kind person, or even a mildly tolerable one.

Still, Sanji let it go, and they had another couple drinks, talking about nothing of great importance. It was so normal that an outsider could have mistaken them for close friends, and something about that idea annoyed Zoro. He wrapped an arm low around Sanji's waist, and didn't move it until they finally got up to leave, paying off their share of the tab.

They took a cab up to Astoria, where everyone was presumably already waiting for them at Shakky's bar. Sure enough, when they got inside, Luffy started shouting and waving his arms around wildly to flag them down, and they headed over to squeeze themselves in amongst the group, being immediately passed a couple glasses of beer.

They had only been sitting there for about fifteen minutes when the bar got noticeably quieter and Shakky and Kuina parted the crowd, both holding opposite ends of a platter containing a huge cake with exactly twenty-eight lit candles sticking out of it.

Sanji smiled drunkenly up at them as they slid the cake onto the table in front of him, and Zoro leaned close to whisper in his ear, echoing Sanji's exact words from that first night they'd spent together: "Make a wish."

There was a pause as Sanji thought, then he pursed his lips and blew as hard as he could. The flames went out, and Shakky and Kuina both leaned forward to start pulling candles out, and then everyone but Zoro and Sanji began to sing _Happy Birthday_ , which the rest of the bar quickly joined in on, and Sanji was shouting at them and trying to get them to be quiet. He probably looked pleased underneath his blush, but Zoro couldn't really tell.

Soon there were slices of cake being cut, and when Luffy's hand shot out of nowhere to try and grab a plate, Shakky grabbed him hard by the wrist and began to bend it back. "Birthday boy gets the first piece," she said dangerously, and Luffy deflated, easing back from his half-sprawled position over Nami and Ace.

Once Sanji had a plate in front of himself, everyone waited patiently for him to make a decision about his first bite, which he ate slowly, savoring it.

"How does the fancy cook like it?" Shakky asked. It was apparent that she'd already eased into teasing Sanji the same way she did to Zoro. At the very least, Sanji seemed pleased about it, as if he was glad to be accepted so easily.

"It's really good. Did you make it?" asked Sanji. He seemed to have reached the stage of drunkenness where he forgot all about manners, and had just started shoving cake into his mouth as he spoke.

"No. We got it from a bakery," Kuina said.

"Mm. It's amazing."

"Good." And with that, plates of cake were passed around to everyone else, satisfying Luffy for the time being. Zoro passed up his own slice, but Shakky brought out a bottle of his favorite vodka and a shotglass, so that was fine by him.

The amount of cake diminished over the course of the hour, and slowly, almost everyone seemed to head off from the booth to hang around elsewhere. Zoro was left with Sanji, Shakky, and Kuina, and the three of them began coming up with plans despite no input from Zoro.

"We should all go to dinner sometime," Kuina said, tapping at the table with her short nails. "Do a better job of catching up, maybe."

"I always thought you hated me," Sanji said, drunkenly honest.

"Nah. You're like a little brother to me, you were just really annoying. More annoying than him, even," Kuina said, pointing an accusing finger at Zoro. "Obviously you're a bit better now."

Sanji looked pleased, and ducked his head a little. "Thanks."

She laughed and smacked him on the back, making him sway forward. "C'mon, you honestly think I'd act awful toward you? Zoro's got good judgment, I don't think he'd be with you if you weren't half decent."

And Zoro wanted that to be true, but he wasn't so sure. It would take a lot for him to push Sanji aside. At the very least, he was entirely secure in the knowledge that Sanji _was_ half decent, and he was fairly sure that he didn't have to worry about a repeat of their last failed relationship with each other.

Kuina and Shakky wandered off a few minutes later, but not before delivering a kiss apiece from both of them to Sanji's cheeks. Sanji was distinctly pink-faced, and Zoro had to laugh at him. "Having fun yet?"

"I was always having fun. Maybe I should be asking _you_ that question," said Sanji, sneaking another piece of cake onto his plate.

"I've got vodka, of course I'm having fun."

"Hm. Go ask Shakky if they have any milk."

"It's a fucking _bar_ , why the hell would they have milk?"

"Fine, I'll go ask," Sanji said, and slid over Zoro to get out of the booth. It was a move that was entirely too focused right on certain areas of Zoro's lap that would have been incredibly excited about the position if he weren't a little too drunk to get it up.

He grumbled and walked behind Sanji to the bar, where Shakky was speaking to an older man with a scar over his right eye. They leaned there patiently, waiting for her to finish talking, and it gave Zoro time to check around the room and see what everyone was up to. Nami, Luffy, Franky, and Ace were playing cards with a couple of loud, rowdy construction workers, and Brook was talking with extremely exaggerated hand gestures toward Robin. And Kuina was standing behind the bar with Shakky, so that meant everyone was fine where they were.

He slanted his gaze back toward Sanji, whose eyes had flicked to the side where a pretty woman was sitting at the bar further down, laughing at something her friend was saying. His eyes flicked up and down her frame once before sliding guiltily back to Zoro. "Sorry," he said.

Zoro shrugged his shoulders. "Whatever. As long as you don't actually try to go home with her."

"I don't wanna go home with anybody but you," Sanji said dopily.

And sure enough, when they left at the end of the night, they left alone, though they were somewhat more saddled down than they'd been at the beginning, with a few bags full of gifts and a set of tickets for Luffy's next boxing match. From the bar, they meandered toward the subway station, and it was the drunkest Zoro had been in a long while. There was nothing elegant about it all; they were both pretty sloppy, and weaving all over the sidewalk. At one point, Zoro managed to trip himself up in a turnstile, and Sanji didn't stop chuckling to himself for nearly ten minutes.

At last, they were in a mostly-empty subway car on the way home, obstinately clinging to a rail rather than sitting down. It was kind of nauseating, but then Zoro was a belligerent drunk, often doing the exact opposite of what he actually wanted to do. Sanji was slumped against his back, chin on Zoro's shoulder, hands curled into the pockets of Zoro's jacket.

"Falling asleep back there?" Zoro asked.

"Mm, nope. Cold now."

"Should have brought a jacket."

"I did. Didn't I?"

"... Did you?" Zoro tried to think back to the beginning of the night, though it wasn't easy in his current state, and he thought he vaguely remembered that Sanji had been wearing _something_ over his short-sleeved button-up. "Shit. Was your wallet in it?"

Sanji shifted against him as he presumably checked his pockets. "Nah. Everything's right here. I'll miss that jacket though."

"We can go back and get it tomorrow."

"I don't remember where we left it. It's fine." He leaned up against Zoro's back again and went silent, chin digging hard into the join of Zoro's shoulder and neck. It was almost comfortable despite the awkward positioning, Sanji doing his best to surround Zoro, bumping against him every time the train hit a rough spot on the tracks.

They disembarked in Prospect Heights a while later, and as they wandered down streets, Sanji became increasingly distracted, lagging behind further and further.

"What's your problem?" Zoro asked, pulling to a stop in annoyance.

"I have to pee."

"We'll be home in a couple minutes, you can pee then," Zoro said.

Sanji whined dramatically. "I really have to."

"Well what the hell do you want me to do about it?"

"Cover me."

Zoro gave him a disbelieving look, eyebrows up and mouth slightly open. "I'm not gonna _cover you_ while you take a piss on a public street."

"C'mon. It'll be like old times."

"Old times took place in a field in the middle of nowhere," Zoro said.

"Zoro..."

"No. We're two minutes away from home, you can hold it that long. Unless you _want_ me to arrest you."

Sanji went silent, petulance radiating from him the rest of the way home. When they got inside at last, Sanji dropped his bags and headed straight for the bathroom, and Zoro took his time getting out of his shoes and coat. At some point, the door to the bathroom opened again, and then the back door opened and closed, Sanji probably going out for a cigarette. In the kitchen, Zoro poured a couple glasses of water, then took them out onto the back porch.

Only he had to pause in the doorway. There was an unkempt-looking black cat sitting on Sanji's lap as he smoked his cigarette, using one of his hands to pet the cat behind the ears. It looked all too pleased to receive attention, and Sanji was cooing at it quite happily. It was so ridiculous that Zoro had to laugh.

Sanji turned his head to glower at Zoro. "Shut up."

"Making friends?"

"Yes. I feed him all the time," said Sanji.

"You feed a stray cat in _my_ neighborhood. I'm not surprised. Here, drink this," Zoro said, and passed Sanji the glass of water. He guzzled it down thirstily and placed it beside himself, put out his cigarette and tossed it into the trash bin, then carefully lowered the cat back to the pavement.

"Goodbye, Meow Meow," he muttered, giving it one last pat, and Zoro bit his lip hard to keep from bursting into laughter again. Sanji stood up, and they headed back into the house, where Zoro got another refill for the both of them.

"Drink," he said as he held Sanji's glass back out. "I don't want to hear you whining tomorrow about being hungover."

"Whatever," Sanji said, though he downed this glass as well.

They finished up, placing their empty cups in the sink, then began flipping off lights and locking doors to head upstairs, where they struggled to get ready for bed. Sanji could barely hold himself up long enough to strip out of his clothes, and then he sat on the bathroom floor while brushing his teeth so that Zoro tripped over him on the way to do the same. But at last, they crawled into bed together and got settled.

"Did you know we've been together almost four months now and I'm not even sick of you yet?" Sanji asked after a while. His head lolled to the side on the pillow, hair falling into the soft streetlight coming in through the windows. It glowed orangey-golden in the near-darkness.

"Did you think you were going to get sick of me?"

"A little. I was worried that I would. But I didn't want to."

Zoro turned his face up toward the ceiling. There was a small patch of deep green paint on it that must have gotten there last time he'd painted the bedroom. "Do you get sick of people easily?"

"Maybe. I've never stuck around long enough to see if I do," said Sanji. His voice was slowly becoming quieter and quieter, but not as if he were about to fall asleep.

Zoro hummed in reply, content to leave it at that.

But Sanji continued. "I wonder why you're so different."

"You must feel obligated to be with me."

Sanji was silent, and slowly Zoro turned his face to look up at him, expecting to see him fallen asleep. But his eyes were wide open and he had a blank look on his face.

"What's wrong?" Zoro asked.

"Mm? Sorry, I zoned out for a minute."

"Go to sleep if you're tired," Zoro said, a warm note of fondness in his voice.

"I'm not. I was thinking, we should go on vacation some time. Together."

"Yeah? Where to?"

"I dunno. Anywhere."

"Is that what you want for your birthday?"

"I guess. But not anytime soon, wait until summer."

"Fine. We'll go somewhere then. Together."

* * *

Zoro didn't feel awful at all the next morning. Sanji, however, refused to get out of bed or open his eyes, and generally grumbled and whined a lot until Zoro gave up and went downstairs to fix breakfast on his own.

It was while he was in the kitchen eating toast that he began to get an idea, and he knew that it would likely blow up in his face, but all the same he found himself looking up a recipe for chocolate cake. It wasn't surprising that he had all the necessary ingredients, not with Sanji's tendency to bring his own and then leave them behind, but all the same, there was some part of Zoro that was immeasurably pleased about how Sanji had left his mark on Zoro's home in this manner.

So he spent the better part of his morning figuring out how to bake a cake. It was at once much easier and much harder than he'd thought it would be from watching Sanji do it, and entirely too messy, but surprisingly not a complete disaster. He'd managed to bake the cake too long, then the piece he cut off from the top to make it level was a little too salty, and the kitchen would likely never recover from him splattering milk everywhere when it came time to make the frosting.

But it was done. It wasn't pretty, and it had a flavor that was more confusing than good, but he'd tried. And now he knew that he was never going to bake again.

At the very least, Sanji didn't witness any of it, considering that by the time he rolled out of bed, it was well after four in the afternoon, a fact that he was very grumpy about.

"You should be used to this," Zoro said, when he'd had enough of listening to Sanji sigh about how the day was already practically over. "How did you spend summers as a teenager again?"

"Shut up. I can't sleep in anymore, I'm an adult now."

"Could have fooled me."

"You know what, Zoro? You can shut your shitty mouth and get me some coffee if you know what's good for you," Sanji said. His eyes were slitted against the light, and Zoro forewent teasing him anymore, just got to work putting the coffee maker on.

Sanji climbed up onto one of the barstools and put his head down, waiting for the coffee to finish brewing. When it did, Zoro fixed a cup for him just the way he liked it (far too much sugar and Sanji's fancy Cinnabon creamer), then placed it in front of Sanji, who finally seemed to have found some amount of joy in his otherwise awful world.

"Happy birthday," Zoro said gruffly, and dropped a kiss on Sanji's cheek as he gulped at his coffee.

"Mm. Thanks. ...Why does it smell like something's burning?" he asked after he'd downed half of the cup.

"Uh," Zoro said. He groped frantically around in his mind for any kind of excuse that wasn't related to his failed attempt at baking a cake. "I left my sandwich from lunch the other day in the oven too long."

Sanji chuckled into his mug. "You're really useless in the kitchen without me around, aren't you?"

_You don't even know the half of it_ , Zoro thought. "I was distracted."

"Okay, well try not to burn the house down, moss-for-brains. What time are our reservations for?" he asked, and it was obvious to Zoro that he wanted to spend as much time lazing around as possible. For all that he was up and about the second he awoke, he was entirely too lazy when left to his own devices.

"We have to leave here by six."

With a grumble and a quick stretch, Sanji climbed off the barstool and walked his cup over to the sink, draining the rest of it before rinsing it out. Then he went upstairs, presumably to take a shower. Zoro considered having a nap in the meantime, and he'd even gotten upstairs and back into bed before Sanji came out of the shower and proceeded to dress himself, which Zoro was distracted into watching. He put on boxer briefs, black dress pants, and the marigold-colored button-up that Zoro was quickly growing to love, but when that was all over, Zoro closed his eyes, ready to fall asleep. Except Sanji refused to let that happen, instead nagging him to get up.

"We have another hour," Zoro groaned, and shuffled further toward the center of the bed so that Sanji would stop pinching him in the side.

But it didn't work. Sanji leapt onto him, knocking the breath out of his lungs, and came to rest with his palms over Zoro's shoulders, staring down at him. "Get up."

"I can't get up when you're on top of me," Zoro said.

"Excuses."

"Go away, let me sleep."

Sanji huffed and dropped his full weight on top of Zoro, scratchy facial hair scraping against the side of Zoro's neck.

"Do you ever think about shaving all that off?"

"You don't like it?" Sanji asked, and rubbed his chin all over Zoro's neck until it burned.

"I don't mind it."

"Hm. You always shave your face, so you don't understand the benefits."

"I look weird with facial hair."

"Or maybe you get annoyed when people ask about why it's green," Sanji said, relenting on the beard burn and trailing his rough fingertips over Zoro's scalp instead.

"How do you know it's green?"

"I've seen your pubes, I'm not an idiot," Sanji said, pushing off of Zoro. "Unless you dye them too."

"There's something seriously fucking wrong if you think I'm the vain one in this relationship."

Sanji scoffed. "Whatever. Would you please get up and get dressed before I have to do it for you?"

Zoro grunted and wrapped his arms around a pillow, drawing it under his chest. "No."

There was silence in the room then. It stretched until Zoro got curious, and he turned his head to see that Sanji was inside the closet, bent over picking through everything on the floor. He huffed out a breath in annoyance, beginning to feel unable to ignore Sanji's increasingly desperate attempts at getting him up.

"Thought you said you didn't have any dress shoes?" Sanji asked, and held up the pair that Zoro had worn to Kuina and Shakky's wedding.

"They were in there?"

"Yeah. Here," Sanji said, and tossed the shoes at Zoro's face. He swatted them out of the air, and stood slowly, bones creaking as he crossed the room to the closet and pushed past Sanji so he could find something to wear.

In the end, he dressed himself much the same as Sanji had - dress pants with the black button-up from his previous excursion with Robin and Kuina, then the dress shoes. It was just as uncomfortable as he remembered it being, and he made a face as Sanji fixed the collar of his shirt. "Stop grooming me."

"I'm making you look presentable, shut up."

"You're making me sit around in this getup for the next hour when you know I hate wearing this bullshit."

"Well I like it when you look nice, so you can kiss my fucking ass," Sanji said, and yanked hard on the hem of Zoro's shirt, forcefully tucking it in.

"At the rate you're going, I'm never going to touch your ass again."

"No complaints here."

"Fuck off," Zoro growled, pushing the pointy tip of his shoe into Sanji's ankle. The smile Sanji gave him was sharp and mean, and Zoro didn't have any problems kissing it right off his face.

* * *

The restaurant they'd booked reservations for a couple weeks ago was much, much nicer than Zoro had expected it to be. There was no mistaking what two people would be here for together - it wasn't the place to have a business dinner, a graduation celebration, or a family get-together. No, this was the kind of place you took somebody to propose to them, or for an anniversary dinner.

Or to have a romantic birthday dinner with someone you really cared for. Zoro grimaced as he looked around the room, noting that most of the people here were overtly intimate with each other. There was hand-holding, sugary looks, and he'd bet any amount of money that there was some footsy going on too.

"I hope you don't expect me to act like that with you," he whispered in Sanji's ear as they were led to their table.

Sanji nudged him in the side, smirking. "You don't like me enough to hold my hand?"

"I didn't come here to hold hands. I came here because it's your birthday and you wanted to," said Zoro.

"And what if I want to hold hands on my birthday?"

"... I'd do it. I wouldn't be happy about it though."

Sanji's smirk had faded down into a playful smile. "I'm just fucking with you."

They were seated and took a couple minutes to look over the menu, Sanji throwing out comments every so often about what sounded good. Zoro noticed that he was completely avoiding talking about the wine list though.

"You don't want wine?" he asked.

Sanji's face actually turned a little green at the prospect, and he shook his head quickly. "No. I think I've had enough alcohol for a while. What are you going to get?"

"I dunno," said Zoro, letting his eyes continue to trail over words that meant absolutely nothing to him.

Sanji drew in a soft breath, and shook his hair back into its place covering his right eye. Over time, Zoro had come to notice that he often had one eye or the other covered with his hair, and he wondered why that was. Even when they were alone, it was rare to see both of his eyes. "Mm. Well, everything here is good, but the seafood will be especially fresh today... Also, I'd recommend going for the more unique dishes. Risotto and ravioli are all well and good but those are things you can eat anywhere else, and for a lot cheaper too."

"I'll keep that in mind," Zoro said, amused both at the fact that Sanji seemed to turn into a high-class waiter while explaining the menu to him, and that he thought that kind of advice would actually benefit Zoro any.

Still, he eventually ordered braised veal and agnolotti topped with herb butter and sharp white cheese, while Sanji chose roasted lamb with vegetables and white truffle penne. Zoro wasn't expecting much, but when it came out, it smelled delicious. And he soon realized that it tasted just as good as it smelled; it was an incredible meal, and as much as he wanted to hold Sanji's cooking in the highest position of esteem forever, Zoro had to admit that this certainly gave it a run for its money. Whoever had made it obviously _cared_ , and wanted it to show.

"I can't believe I'm nearly thirty," Sanji said as they were wrapping up.

"Why?"

"It's just, do you ever think about how much time has passed since we were kids?"

Zoro _knew_ that a lot of time had passed, but it wasn't something that really felt astonishing to him until that moment. If he really cared to do the math, he could figure out exactly how many days, hours, minutes, seconds Sanji had been in his life. More astonishing was just how many years he'd survived _without_ Sanji. It was strange to consider that, for all that their lives were intertwined, Sanji hadn't actually been there for so many important things that had shaped Zoro. "Huh."

"Soon we'll be officially middle-aged," Sanji said, cutting off one of his final chunks of lamb. "A third of our lives are basically gone."

"You don't really sound upset about that."

"Nah. Why should we fear getting older? I don't want to spend my time worrying more about where I'll be in a couple years than on what I can be now. I want to focus on the present, but the future is important to me too."

Zoro liked the sentiment of it, but there was no way he could possibly do that himself. His youth was everything he had; there'd be a point someday where his joints would ache too much to practice the way he did now. The force behind his blows would weaken. And finally, he'd be too old to be taken seriously. Time was his enemy. Maybe for Sanji it was something to look forward to, and in a way, Zoro wanted the knowledge of being older, but he wanted to hold off on it for as long as possible.

In all honesty, though, he would let it come, if only to share more moments like these with Sanji, for as long as he could.

* * *

They were all the way home, undressed, and Zoro, at least, was in bed before Sanji started acting strangely. He'd been searching through the pockets of his discarded pants and the dresser drawers for a good five minutes now, and Zoro could do nothing but stare from his position in bed.

"What are you doing?" he asked as Sanji got down on his knees to look through the nightstand drawers.

Sanji glanced up for just a second. "I can't figure out where the hell my phone is. What are _you_ doing?"

"Nothing."

"Great. I'm gonna go check downstairs for it, then I'll be right back up," Sanji said with a wink that implied exactly what he wanted to do when he returned.

Zoro laid back against the pillows, debating between letting himself fall asleep or staying awake for Sanji. Sex was awesome, but sleep was necessary, and besides, they could fuck after he'd had a nap.

He'd managed to get settled and ready for a nap when Sanji came back in, phone in one hand, plate containing a fork and a single slice of Zoro's failed chocolate cake in the other.

"So," Sanji said, putting the plate onto the nightstand by Zoro's head. "What's this?"

"... Nothing."

"Really? Because it looks like chocolate cake. Why would you possibly have chocolate cake?"

"Because... no reason," Zoro said shiftily.

Sanji made a noise of dissatisfaction and crawled over Zoro to get to his own side of the bed before leaning over and taking up the plate of cake again. "Did you make me a cake for my birthday?" he asked in a gentle, non-judgmental tone.

Zoro sighed, embarrassed for some reason. "... Yeah. It's not going to be good though. I fucked it up a lot."

"We'll see," said Sanji, and he forked off a bit.

The face he made upon popping it into his mouth was one of consideration, but not disgust. "It's not bad," he said. "It's definitely not perfect but..." He paused and took another bite before speaking again. "That's fine. It's kinda cute that you made me a birthday cake."

"Shut up."

"Really. Thank you."

"Whatever. It's your birthday and you didn't want anything, so I figured I could do something for you."

Sanji kept eating until the entire piece was gone, and even scraped up the bits of crumbs and tiny smears of icing on the plate before putting it down. "You're really pretty thoughtful, you know? You shouldn't be ashamed of it."

Zoro was silent, forearm covering his eyes until Sanji leaned over and pulled it away. The kiss he gave Zoro then tasted cloyingly sweet, but he surrendered to it anyway, letting Sanji show his thanks how he preferred to. It wasn't as though it was really a hardship.

"Good birthday?" he asked when Sanji finally pulled back.

"Good birthday," Sanji confirmed, and leaned in for another kiss, one that drifted off-course and migrated down the length of Zoro's neck to his bare chest, nibbling along his scar until the skin there felt more numb than usual. Sanji's hair tickled across his stomach as he worked his way further down, hands tugging Zoro's boxers off just enough that he could get his mouth on Zoro's cock.

One of the things that Zoro had come to learn was that Sanji rarely liked to suck him; it was something he saved for moments when he was in a good mood, or as currency to have his way. Sanji wasn't exactly selfish in bed, but he definitely knew what he wanted, and stuck to it - a complete 180 from Zoro, who was the kind of person that got off on getting others off.

Still, he figured he could let Sanji do what he liked, and he threaded his fingers through Sanji's hair, cradling the back of his skull as he moved his head up and down teasingly, his tongue flicking across the tip of Zoro's cock on every upstroke.

Zoro had figured it was foreplay, so it shocked him a little when Sanji kept going even after he was hard enough. Not that he was complaining, but... "Hey. I thought it was your birthday?"

Sanji pulled up and off, looking confused. "Yeah?"

"So don't you deserve to be taking it easy?"

"Oh. I'm fine with this," Sanji said, nuzzling back down to place a couple licks along the length of the shaft. "I want to."

Zoro went quiet, unable to deny him, and Sanji got back to it until Zoro got an idea and shoved him by the shoulder back onto the bed.

"Hey-" Sanji said, annoyed, but Zoro ignored him, tugging his underwear down just enough that he could get Sanji's cock out.

Then Sanji seemed to get the point, going to his knees and climbing over Zoro's face before getting on all fours and going back to sucking at Zoro. It left their bodies perfectly parallel, and Zoro was able to pick his head up and get at Sanji's cock, swallowing him down as well as he could. At first it was somewhat strange and uncomfortable, stifling as if he could choke at any second, but they got it figured out well enough.

The problem was that Zoro was just too fucking close. Considering Sanji's prior treatment of him, that wasn't surprising, but he liked it when he could get Sanji off first.

At this point, he was fairly well-versed in what Sanji liked, and he put that knowledge to good use. Plenty of suction and long, deep strokes had him straining into Zoro, pushing his hips down as much as he could without causing too much discomfort. Best of all, he had groaned and pulled his mouth off of Zoro's cock, unable to do much but clutch the sheets as he attempted to balance on that fine line of perfect pleasure. It was enough to back Zoro down from the precipice.

And with that out of the way, he could slow it down a little, stop being so frantic to get Sanji caught up. He drew his mouth back, not even pausing when Sanji made a disappointed sound at the loss. Throughout it all, he'd been inching Sanji's boxers down further, and now he could slowly trail his tongue upward, sliding over Sanji's balls before flicking across his hole.

Sanji squirmed back against him, and a sense of smug satisfaction filled Zoro. It wasn't that he wanted Sanji wrapped around his finger, but every time he did something and Sanji seemed to be into it, he still felt overwhelmingly powerful.

So he continued, pressing in firmly until Sanji made a choked noise, legs trembling as if to fight from bucking against Zoro. He seemed to be completely distracted from sucking Zoro off now, which was kind of annoying, but at the same time, Zoro was so absorbed in taking care of him that he hardly noticed.

He had to admit, there was some perverse quality to this that he particularly enjoyed, holding Sanji across his back while he licked him open. And the noises Sanji made when he did this were profoundly different than the ones he made when Zoro fucked him; they were quieter, breathier, but deeper in a way. He could actually _feel_ the vibration of groans as Sanji laid his head down on Zoro's thigh, wet heat of his mouth returning to its previous position.

It was hot as hell. But it was tiring too, and eventually he let his mouth fall away, instead sliding a finger into Sanji while licking at his cock. It didn't seem to upset Sanji a bit, so after a few moments, he pushed in a second and let Sanji press down into his mouth and up into his fingers, working himself between Zoro's hand and mouth. All the while, he was back to sucking at Zoro, and it wasn't long before the both of them were unable to hold off.

The fingers of his other hand gripped tight on Sanji's ass in warning before Zoro slipped over the edge, hips jumping up just slightly before he caught control of himself and forced them back down into the mattress. And that was it for Sanji too, coming with a few more thrusts of Zoro's fingers inside him.

Sanji collapsed sideways onto the bed after Zoro had finished wringing him of every single drop, seemingly too liquified to even move his head up to the pillows. Zoro laughed hoarsely and tugged at him, trying to get him to come back up.

"C'mon, get up," he said, swatting Sanji across the ass until he rolled over in increments, and finally swung his legs over the edge of the bed. Zoro stood and followed him into the bathroom.

It was a strangely funny sight, to see them both standing naked and flushed in front of the mirror as they brushed their teeth and washed their faces, preparing for bed as if nothing had just happened. He bumped his shoulder against Sanji's, and Sanji bumped back, smiling.

"It wasn't a good birthday after all," he said, taking his toothbrush out of his mouth. "It was the best."


	12. The More You Ignore Me, the Closer I Get

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just wanted to say thank you for the subscriptions, kudos, bookmarks, recs, and simply for reading this far! It really means so much to me and there's not words enough to express how grateful I am. Onward!

Zoro had worked third shift Thursday night, and by the time he awoke on Friday, it was pushing six in the evening. He grumbled, knowing that Sanji would be over soon and that he'd be annoyed if Zoro wasn't ready, and so even though he wanted nothing more than to lay in bed and take a post-awakening nap, Zoro got up and went sleepily to the shower, rubbing his eyes the whole way.

He took his time washing up, still half-asleep and lazy. Once he finished rinsing the shampoo out of his hair and shaving the scattering of stubble on his jaw, he dried himself off and pulled on a pair of gray-wash jeans (Sanji's influence) and a Bikini Kill t-shirt with a hole in one shoulder. Then he tromped down the stairs and into the kitchen, where Sanji was getting plates out of the dishwasher.

There was a spread of bottled drinks and fast-food bags on the counter, greasy and smelling far too appetizing, but Zoro went straight for Sanji instead, wrapping both arms around his skinny waist and laying a kiss at the nape of his neck.

"Hey," Sanji said, beginning to distribute foil-encased burritos on the plates. He sounded tired but not unhappy, and he leaned ever so slightly into Zoro's grip.

That was a good sign, Zoro figured. He rubbed his nose into the crook of Sanji's neck, inhaling deeply, and let his hands slide down to curl over Sanji's hips. "You smell good."

"Thank you. It's called a shower."

"I know what showers are."

"Could've fooled me," said Sanji, with a teasing smile on his face.

Zoro grunted, thoroughly unamused, and took the plate that Sanji handed to him, then headed to the bar. He was tearing into his burrito almost before he even sat down, and not for the first time, cursed the work schedule that threw off his (much more important) sleeping and eating schedules.

"I think I'm rubbing off on you," Sanji announced, putting a wad of napkins down between them before taking his own seat and stripping the foil off of his burrito.

"Why's that?" Zoro asked through a mouthful of half-chewed food.

"You actually dressed yourself half-decently. Too bad you haven't learned any manners from me yet."

Deliberately, Zoro wiped his mouth off on the sleeve of his shirt. Sanji made a disgusted noise, but refused to rise to the bait, digging into his burrito with a fork as if to demonstrate how cultured and tidy he was.

They spoke little as they ate, and soon finished their meal, then put their dishes in the sink to clean up later. For once, they managed to get out the door on time, though Sanji insisted that they take a taxi rather than chancing it on the subway.

When they got to the Garden, they went through the usual process of handing in their tickets and seating themselves. The arena was nearly full, and Nami was looking extremely annoyed as they slid in past her. Sanji spouted off plenty of nonsense apologies (about what, no one could be sure), but Zoro's attention wasn't on that; rather, he was completely silent as his eyes scanned over the crowd, looking for the woman that had escaped from him last time.

Sure enough, she was exactly where she'd been during the previous fight, though she had companions this time. One of them was a tall woman with wavy green hair, dressed in a white cape to match the black-haired woman. The other was hefty and well-muscled, with a mass of ginger hair twisted up in what appeared to be a very time-consuming hairstyle. She too had a white cape, and it would have been almost amusing how gang-like they looked if they weren't also so intimidating.

Someone else caught Zoro's eye then. In the row directly behind he and Sanji was a man even more intimidating than the trio of cape-wearing women. There was no word to describe him but _gargantuan_ , tall and wide with skin like leather and curly black hair on his head, barely restrained by a bandana. His chest and arms were huge, and it was lucky that his shirt even managed to close over them.

In short, he was hard to miss, but that wasn't why Zoro found himself staring. He too looked overwhelmingly familiar, though unlike the woman, Zoro was fairly sure he had seen this man under unsavory circumstances, and also unlike the woman, Zoro wasn't incredibly bothered about knowing his identity. That was the kind of person who, at this point in his life, Zoro knew better than to linger on; still, that knowledge wasn't enough to _stop_ him.

It wasn't as though he had much choice in the matter though, because the lights soon lowered and the announcer took to his mic, stirring up the crowd as Luffy and Enel made their entrances.

Zoro turned his gaze back toward the ring, feeling strangely apprehensive; having seen a couple of Enel's fights before, a part of him felt justified in its worry. He knew that Enel's claims of being the god of middleweight boxing were bullshit, but he also knew that Enel didn't fight because he had something to prove. He was the kind of sadistic asshole who _played_ with his opponents, like it was a game and not a genuinely dangerous sport where people could and _had_ died.

Zoro couldn't respect a man like that, no matter how good his fighting style was. Not when he knew how seriously Luffy took this, not when Enel hadn't worked anywhere near as hard to get here. He felt even more justified in his dislike when he watched Enel refuse the pre-match handshake.

And as he saw the fire ignite in Luffy at that, he realized how foolish it had been to worry. There was no way Luffy wouldn't hand Enel's own ass back to him by the end of the night.

It wasn't going to be anywhere as easy as his imagination wanted to believe, though, and that point was quickly driven home as the first round began. They were drawn to the center, the bell rang, and this time there was no circling, no waiting for each other to make a move. Enel and Luffy both sprang forward, jabbing at each other. They landed a couple blows apiece, but none of them were particularly strong or deadly, and the round ended without any downs, both of them going back to their neutral corners unscathed.

As they were being tended to by their managers, Zoro took the time to glance over at Sanji. He was rigid with tension, hands gripping the railing tightly. Apparently, he was nowhere near as confident about the night's end as Zoro was, which was strange, considering Sanji always seemed to be one of the most optimistic people in their group. Zoro was about to ask what was wrong when a voice boomed out from behind them.

"Kid's gonna knock the hell outta Enel."

Zoro glanced up to see the huge man from before, who was smiling widely, gazing down at them. Half his teeth were missing, and it made him suddenly all the more fearsome to behold.

Sanji had turned to look too, and the eyebrow that wasn't covered by hair raised quite high on his forehead. His agitation had momentarily disappeared, only to be replaced by confusion.

"Isn't that right, little duck?" the man asked, turning his unsettling smile on Sanji, whose face was suddenly colored by unease. He said nothing, though the man didn't seem bothered by that, as he merely pulled a flask out of one of his pockets and took a long guzzle from it before speaking again. "Got a mean right hook, that kid. Zehahaha!"

"Yeah," said Sanji, seeming to have recovered ever so slightly. "He's really good."

"I bet you're obligated to say that, but that doesn't mean you're not right, little duck," said the man, taking another swig from his flask.

"Do I know you?" Sanji asked, starting to look less flustered and more angry.

"I don't know, do you?" asked the man, far too jolly as he clapped Sanji on the shoulder, making him stagger in place.

Sanji's eyes narrowed, but before he could retort, Zoro reached out and grabbed the man hard around his large forearm. "I might be off-duty but I don't mind arresting you if you're going to continue to bother him. Drunk and disorderly, maybe?"

"Zehahaha! I didn't mean any harm!" But contrary to his words, the man hadn't released his grip on Sanji's shoulder.

Zoro was about to threaten him further, but was interrupted by the crowd's sudden surging roar as the bell rang to signal the start of the second round.

Reluctantly, he turned his gaze back down to the ring. Enel's punches were like lightning strikes, fast and crippling. Luffy nearly buckled under the force more than once, but he managed to stay on his feet each time, returning his own shattering blows to Enel's stomach. He even downed him once, but the referee only counted to two before Enel was up again.

They pulled back, seeming to reassess each other. A few test punches were thrown, though both of them were fairly good at bobbing and weaving away. The second round ended without any further advancement, and they parted, though Enel was still grinning tauntingly at Luffy.

Zoro glanced back over at Sanji, and was glad to see that the man had returned his hands to himself. But Sanji hadn't completely relaxed again; there was a tension around his mouth, as if he was just waiting to tell the guy off. Zoro put his hand down on top of Sanji's, hoping that the contact would ease him a little.

The crowd erupted when the third round started, and it took Zoro a moment to realize that the vibrating he felt wasn't the stomp of feet on the floor or the air shaking with cries of triumph, but his phone. He fished it out and sighed upon seeing Smoker's name. Whatever it was, it wasn't going to be good, since he wouldn't bother Zoro if he didn't have to.

Zoro nudged Sanji and waved his phone around, and Sanji seemed to get the point easily, nodding and making shooing motions with his hands, so Zoro stood. He received his fair share of annoyed looks as he pushed out of the row and into the aisle, but he ignored them, mind suddenly racing as he pounded up the stairs.

By the time he got into the lobby, his phone had stopped ringing, and though there was still the distant roar of voices, Zoro hit Smoker's speed dial anyway.

He picked up promptly. "Hey."

"What's up?" Zoro asked.

"How do you feel about comin' to work right now?" Smoker asked, letting out a huff of smoke into the phone.

"Not great," said Zoro. "But I'm sure I'll have to anyway."

"Yeah. Lovely day for a kidnapping, apparently. Tashigi's already at the station, so get over here and we'll talk more."

"Alright." After hanging up, Zoro sent a text to Sanji letting him know that something had come up, and that he'd be back home as soon as he could, but not to expect him for another few hours at least. There was no answer, though he figured that was normal considering there was no way Sanji would be able to hear his phone over all the noise in the stadium.

Knowing that traffic would be complete shit on a Friday night, Zoro took the subway out to Brooklyn. A little over half an hour later, he was back at the station, where Tashigi and Smoker were already waiting for him in his office, and he hurried in, flopping down in his desk chair.

"What's the deal?" he asked.

"We got a call from your sister-in-law, actually. Said a friend of hers has been missin' for several days now, hasn't been in his apartment at all," Smoker said.

"She wouldn't just make a call like that without reason," Zoro admitted. "But how do you know this friend didn't just skip town, or maybe he's staying with someone?"

"Yeah. We thought that too at first, but she said he always calls to let her know if he's going to be away for a while."

"Maybe he forgot."

"Or maybe we have witnesses who say they saw him involved in a confrontation with two men, who then proceeded to zip-tie him and put him in a van."

"Were they trying to imitate every dramatic cop show ever?" Zoro asked, chuckling.

Tashigi, who'd been mostly silent throughout the exchange, finally spoke up. "There've been a couple rumors lately that they're starting the Human Auction again."

"I've heard it too," Zoro said. He turned to look at Smoker, whose mouth was pinched around his cigar. "You can't deny that shit's hitting the fan now."

"Nah. Wasn't gonna," said Smoker.

"So do we know anything, or...?"

"Shakky said she'd be willing to help with anything we needed," Tashigi said. "Other than that, all we know is that he's been missing for a few days, there were witnesses, and we've got security footage from a couple of the surrounding buildings."

"And by that you mean we actually _have_ the footage, not that it's sitting in a locker waiting to be stolen," Zoro confirmed.

Tashigi sighed and tapped her fingers on a couple of CD cases sitting on his desk that he hadn't paid any mind to earlier. "Right here."

"Good." He popped the first one, labeled _Quick Stop Gas, Monday March 3, 12:30-12:40AM_ , into his computer's CD drive.

And so they all crowded around the computer to watch the footage. It was black and white, grainy, but a few things became clear to them as they watched it: that the man on-screen didn't struggle against the two huge men who came for him, that he didn't appear frightened even when they pulled guns on him, and that he hadn't, in fact, seemed all that surprised about these proceedings.

It was strange. Zoro had the niggling feeling that he had been _waiting_ for them to come for him.

His phone chimed then, and he pulled it out of his pocket, sliding his thumb across the screen to unlock it.

' _going home now. luffy won - fifth round, enel looked like the world fell out from under him. gonna stop by the store on the way home so we'll actually have food to eat tomorrow. need anything?_ '

Zoro had to pause for a moment at the way Sanji had just used the word _home_ in reference to Zoro's house, because he certainly didn't think of Sanji's apartment as home. It was just a place where he sometimes co-existed with Sanji; a place that had memories associated with it, but he knew he'd never go there at the end of a hard day at work and think, _I'm glad to be here. I'm glad to be_ home.

So he had to wonder if his house actually _did_ feel like home to Sanji, or if he was thinking too deeply into the wording of it. He couldn't help hoping that it was the former rather than the latter.

At last, he typed up a quick reply. ' _tell me about it when i get home. some beer would be nice._ '

"Anyhow," said Tashigi, when Zoro had looked up from his phone. "The victim's name is Silvers Rayleigh. He was the right hand man of Gol D. Roger before his death, but he's supposedly on the straight and narrow now..."

"Huh." Zoro knew the name, and not just from Shakky. It was only that he couldn't remember who had first mentioned Silvers Rayleigh to him, and that was irritating. He wanted to have all the help he could get in this, but for now, he'd have to rely on Shakky. "I'm gonna make a phone call really quick."

Smoker and Tashigi both nodded, and he left the office, heading down the hallway to one of the conference rooms, where he dialed Shakky's number.

She answered with a breath of smoke into the receiver. "I guess you're calling about Rayleigh."

"Yeah. You gotta give me a little to go on if you want him found."

"Sure. What do you want to know about him?"

"Do you think this might have happened because he used to be close to the old King?"

"It's possible. He knows a lot of things that no one else in this city does, and there's a lot of people out there who'd do some pretty rash things to get their hands on that information."

"But he doesn't have his hands in the business anymore?" Zoro asked, grabbing a stray notepad and pen to take notes.

"Nah. His only crime these days is knowing more than he should about everything. He drinks a lot, he's kinda lecherous, and he takes too many trips to Vegas and Atlantic City, but trust me, he's innocent. Runs a car detailing service and has a stake in my bar, actually. We've been good friends for a long time; I'd know if he were up to anything bad."

Zoro made an acknowledging noise, writing down the details in a quick, messy scrawl. "Is he the kind of guy who goes out of his way to get in fights?"

"No. He's pretty good about keeping to himself, and Zoro, really, I normally wouldn't worry about him. He's capable even though he's old, and he wouldn't panic in a situation like that," she said dismissively. "He's kind of a hard-ass. The only reason I even reported it is because I'm sure you'll be interested in finding out who the hell's behind it so you can get them behind bars before anything else happens. This is just the start you need."

"Yeah, thanks for that," he said. "Anyway, you know the drill. I'm sure he's got enemies but he hasn't made any new ones that you know of, has he?"

"Nah. He's done a thorough job of dropping off the radar."

"Okay. And he didn't mention anybody being after him?"

"Uh-uh. He wouldn't have mentioned it even if there _were_ people after him." She let out another stream of smoke into the phone, and cleared her throat. "But he's been mentioning the Human Auction reopening a lot lately."

"You think he expected this?"

"I'm gonna let you in on a secret," Shakky said. "I think not only did he expect it, I think he went looking for it."

Zoro sighed and wrote that down. "Why would he do that?"

"I don't know. Low on gambling money? Sense of adventure? Pure curiosity? There's no telling what goes on in his mind."

"Alright, that's all I've got, but if you figure anything out, or if you hear from him..."

"I know. You're the first one I'll call," she said. "Love you, little brother."

"... Love you too, Shakky. Tell Kuina I love her."

"I will. Take care, okay?"

"Yeah. You too."

They hung up, and Zoro looked down at his notes. While it was incredibly helpful to have someone who knew the victim so well, he wasn't exactly sure where it got them to know that Rayleigh might have done this _intentionally_. If he had truly gone willingly, then technically this wasn't a kidnapping, and thus they had no case.

But that didn't mean Zoro was going to reveal that fact to anyone. If the rumors of the Human Auction's reopening were true, then there was no way he was going to let go of an advantage that had been so willingly given to him.

* * *

Zoro got home around eleven, which wasn't too bad considering. Sometimes when he got called in, he could be out as long as a whole day, but since the next step was talking to the witnesses, they had corroborated as many facts as they could before parting ways.

The house was silent around him. Zoro dropped his keys on the dining room table and glanced through the stack of mail that Sanji had brought in, then proceeded to get himself a bottle of water out of the fridge. On the counter beside it, there was a note alongside a six pack of beer: ' _Going to bed, but you can wake me up._ '

Zoro drained his water bottle, slipped the note into the drawer that he kept all of Sanji's notes in, and put the beer in the fridge.

Then he went upstairs to the bedroom and got undressed in the darkness before crawling into bed. The moon had waned down to just a sliver and there was no light to guide him by, but he could feel the warmth of Sanji's skin as if he were made to gravitate toward it. He settled, and placed a kiss first on one smooth shoulder, then on the nape of Sanji's neck where his hair tickled against Zoro's face. And Sanji didn't stir but to shift closer to him.

* * *

The following day everyone got together again for Franky's birthday, though it wasn't actually until Sunday. They weren't doing anything particularly special, just having dinner at his and Robin's apartment, but it had apparently been Sanji's duty to make the cake, and so he'd spent most of the day in the kitchen baking. Zoro had known better than to disturb him.

Strangely, he and Sanji were the first ones to arrive that evening, and Robin graciously offered them drinks and finger foods from a platter sitting on the coffee table, which Zoro gladly partook in. Sanji, meanwhile, spent his time simpering at Robin, telling her how lovely she looked and how he couldn't wait to eat her food, though she continually told him that it wouldn't be anywhere near as good as his cooking.

Luckily, Zoro didn't have to listen to it for long since Luffy, Ace, and Nami showed up all together, and while Nami joined Sanji and Robin, Ace and Luffy made a beeline right for him.

"How'd the fight go?" he asked Luffy, who had a black eye that was swollen nearly shut.

"I kicked his ass, of course!" said Luffy with a huge grin on his face.

Zoro returned the smile, chuckling quietly. "Awesome."

"It was pretty impressive," Ace piped in. "Guy looked like he'd never been so shocked before. Guess he wasn't a god after all."

"He's just a man," said Zoro. "Of course he's not a god."

The doorbell rang, and in came Usopp, Kaya, Chopper, and Brook, which meant the gang was all there, and so they headed for the dinner table. To no one's surprise, Luffy and Ace were the first seated.

It was a good meal, though Zoro had to agree that it wasn't anywhere close to Sanji's level of skill. That wasn't a bad thing though; Robin was clearly sticking to what she knew, and what she knew was all of Franky's favorite foods: hamburgers, french fries, coleslaw, pasta salad, pork and beans, squash and zucchini, and sweet potatoes.

Sanji spent much of the meal complimenting her while Zoro ate as much as he could get his hands on, stuffing his cheeks full. There was some kind of contest going on between Luffy, Ace, Chopper, Franky, and Brook to put the strangest things on their burgers and have it still taste objectively good, but he wasn't going to get into that.

An hour passed in which everyone was properly fed and watered, and then the talking commenced. Zoro mostly tuned out of it, falling into his post-meal nap, though not before Sanji told a story about how some of the waiters at work were starting a betting pool as to when Vivi and some pink-haired police officer were going to get together. He only awoke when Franky started bawling at the top of his lungs, about how _great_ Sanji was (and this, Zoro realized, meant the cake had been brought out), how great they _all_ were, and how much he loved them, damn it.

Zoro had to admit that he loved them too. They were his family, strange as they all were, and though he was closer with some of them than others, he knew that he was loved by each of them, a sentiment which he was all too pleased to return, even if he rarely said it.

After cake, they adjourned to the living room, where gifts were given, though Franky refused to open them until his actual birthday. Conversation meandered through the usual topics, but Zoro wasn't really focused on it. Instead, he was watching Sanji as he talked, noticing that he looked agitated for some reason; his hands were curled tightly together in his lap, and there was something dead about his eyes, and though he was trying to cover it up by talking just as much as he usually did, it was clear to Zoro that something was off.

"What's up?" he asked once Sanji's end of the conversation had lulled down.

Sanji glanced over at him and raised an eyebrow. The closer Zoro looked, the more easily he could tell that there were slight bags under Sanji's eyes, and that he hadn't really smiled the whole night. "Hm? Nothing."

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," said Sanji, looking confused. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"I dunno. You just look kinda down."

"I'm good. Just a little tired from work lately. One of the line cooks quit, so I've been having to take over until they get a replacement. You'd know that if you'd been listening."

"Alright," Zoro said dubiously. He laid off for the time being, knowing that if he was going to get Sanji to talk at all, it was going to be when they were at home.

As time went on, people began departing: Luffy and Nami to another birthday party at Shanks' house; Usopp and Kaya to their own apartment; Chopper to a late shift at the hospital.

Zoro finally made up his mind to get going too. Sanji had been sleeping on him for the greater part of an hour, and he was getting tired just looking at him, which meant it was time to split before they both wore out their welcome.

"We're gonna head out. This one needs to get some sleep," Zoro said, hooking a thumb at Sanji.

"Alright, thanks for coming man!" said Franky, making Sanji stir at the loudness of his voice. A moment later, his eyes opened and he stretched his arms up, yawning.

Zoro couldn't help but smile. "C'mon, let's go home and get some sleep," he said as he offered a hand to help Sanji up, and if his voice was a little more fond than he'd usually let it be around other people, no one mentioned it.

They were out the door a couple minutes later, after they'd said a few more goodbyes and wished Franky a happy birthday yet again. Sanji managed to sleep through the entire taxi ride home, and when they arrived, Zoro had to nearly drag him up the stairs, into the house, and up yet another set of stairs to the bedroom, where Sanji flopped into bed tiredly.

Zoro sighed, resigned to getting Sanji undressed for bed. Shoes and socks were tugged off first, then jeans unbuttoned and pulled down, and finally, Zoro assessed his shirt. It was a struggle to get Sanji's floppy arms out of it, but Zoro eventually managed it. When it was all done, Sanji crawled up to the pillows and fell back asleep almost immediately.

As much as Zoro wanted to join him, he couldn't. He had work to do, looking into as many underground black market websites as he could get his hands on, attempting to find anything about the Human Auction. The entire time, Sanji kept breathing slow and steady beside him, and it made Zoro want to put off work more than anything.

That night, he fell asleep with his laptop still on his lap, though when he awoke the next morning, it was shut and laying on the nightstand. He glanced over to where Sanji's eyes were shut, brow wrinkled, and wondered if he'd had as much trouble sleeping during the night as his appearance made it seem.

* * *

The police weren't making progress on the kidnapping case, but somehow Zoro hadn't expected them to, and though he'd normally be frantic to find answers, he found himself curiously lacking in distress when they didn't.

In fact, Shakky's description of Rayleigh almost eased his mind about it, guilty as that made him feel. Normally he'd be spending every moment filled with worry, wondering if the victim was dead yet. But this guy was apparently pretty resilient, and what was more, Shakky seemed to think he knew exactly what he was getting himself into.

That was the only reason why Zoro didn't feel entirely awful about calling for a lunch break on Smoker's birthday, even though Smoker complained and suggested that he and Tashigi should be as enthusiastic about work as they were about celebrating.

They'd gone to one of those down-home authentic Italian places that served warm bowls of soup with crusty bread, huge plates of pasta and seafood, and what was apparently the best tiramisu in the city. After Zoro and Tashigi had plied Smoker with good wine and a plate of spaghetti alla carbonara, they got him a slice of the tiramisu (which was just as good as rumor said) and a tiny cup of espresso, which was guaranteed to keep him wired, and thus more likely to snipe at them for the next few hours. But it was what he liked, and that was the whole point of a birthday: to let him have what he liked.

Anyhow, it wasn't as though the lunch was all fun and games. Smoker made sure to bring up the fact that the police charity ball was coming up in a couple weeks, and they were both expected to be there. It was only subtly implied that he'd give them hell if they didn't show up, but they both knew the drill at this point. And at the very least, Smoker let the both of them go home early that night, and Zoro let him believe that they didn't know it was because he was feeling particularly fond and pleased about them.

He still had Saturday and part of Sunday to get through before having Monday off for St. Patrick's Day, but Sanji would be there the entire time. And sure enough, when he finally got home from work on Sunday, Sanji was still there, laid out on the couch with his laptop on his thighs, hair in damp disarray and glasses on. He was wearing a pair of green track pants and one of Zoro's old college t-shirts, and as Zoro came into the living room, he looked up, a smile crossing his face. "Hey."

"Hey. What are you doing?"

"Looking at space for sale," Sanji said, tapping his fingers against the keyboard. "How was work?"

"It was fine. Space for what?"

Sanji shrugged his skinny shoulders. "I just like to look every now and again to see if there's the perfect place for my restaurant."

"And?" Zoro sat down in the remaining space between the arm of the couch and Sanji's feet, and stretched upward, cracking his back and his neck before relaxing bonelessly.

"Nothing good, really."

"You wanna go to bed?"

Sanji smiled. "Not gonna eat?"

"I ate before I left work. You look tired, anyway."

"Sure. Let's go to bed," Sanji said, and they did.

They'd been laying there for a while, Zoro trying his hardest to fall asleep. But something was keeping him on edge, and when he opened his eyes to glance around the room, he was surprised to see that Sanji's own eyes were still wide open.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

Sanji jumped ever so slightly, turning his gaze on Zoro. He looked ashamed, as if he'd been caught out. "C'mere," he whispered, beckoning Zoro across the foot of space between them.

Zoro scootched forward and when Sanji's lips pressed against his, he gratefully welcomed them with his own. It felt like they'd both been too tired and busy to just _touch_ lately. He didn't even particularly miss sex all that much; he just wanted to be close to Sanji, to know that they were sharing the same space, the same air.

They were now, and it eased something inside of Zoro, enough that he could focus himself on kissing Sanji like he hadn't had the time to lately, deep and slow with just enough tongue, a couple nibbles and more than a little competition between them to make the other cave first.

When they'd had enough, they just laid close, and soon enough they were both asleep.

* * *

There were big plans for St. Patrick's Day. While the rest of the city was going to be out celebrating at bars or parties, Zoro and Sanji had a strict schedule of starting the day with beer and a carb-heavy breakfast before moving onto beer and movies, then beer and lunch, and finally, around four, they'd start in with the hard alcohol, then have a dinner of beer and shepherd's pie, and finally, it would be free-drinking until they either passed out or went to the hospital for alcohol poisoning.

Or at least, that's what Zoro had _thought_ the plan was. He probably could have told Sanji the schedule instead of assuming that it went unspoken, but that idea apparently hadn't entered his mind.

So while the first thing he did upon awakening was to shamble downstairs, get a beer out of the fridge and chug it right there in the middle of the kitchen as if it were a normal thing to do, Sanji appeared to be completely bewildered.

"So are you just not feeling sobriety at all today, or..."

Zoro tossed his empty beer bottle into the trash can, then hopped up to sit on the counter right in Sanji's way. "I'm not passing on a day where my only obligation is to get drunk."

"Yeah, I guess that was too much to hope for, huh," said Sanji. He whacked Zoro on the bare thigh with one of his knives (which was luckily still sheathed) as he moved past to get into the fridge for the egg tray, cream, and a wheel of smoked gouda.

Zoro yawned and scratched his stomach but didn't speak, eyes sleepily tracking Sanji across the kitchen as he made hash browns, then cheese sauce and poached eggs, which he layered over toasted croissants with ham. They sat down to eat in the living room, watching highlights of the St. Patrick's Day parade that had taken place over the weekend, which then segued into a reporter talking about the kidnapping, and Zoro groaned, wanting nothing more than to forget about work on his off-day.

Luckily, it was soon pushed out of his mind as he finally coaxed Sanji into the spirit of things, and they began the day in earnest, downing an increasing amount of beers as a marathon of gangster movies ran in the background. They didn't get into the territory of being well and truly drunk until around three, which was a pretty good record for Zoro, and they let off the drinking to settle a little.

"Do you remember when we used to go down to the swimming hole behind Yosaku's house?" Sanji asked, seemingly out of the blue, as they reached the middle of _The Godfather_.

"Yeah. Why?"

"I really wanna go swimming there right now," said Sanji, his voice dreamy and drifting on alcohol.

"It's probably still pretty cold there."

"Hm... You know, the first time I felt like I wanted to do something with you, we were in that swimming hole."

Zoro looked away from the TV, suddenly curious. Sanji didn't often bring up the past, and Zoro was subconsciously always on the lookout for when he did. "Yeah?"

"Uh huh. I think I was fifteen then, maybe. It was before you left. But I don't think I knew that I actually had a crush on you then," Sanji slurred. "I remember thinking that I wanted to kiss you, but it slipped out of my mind so fast... One of those thoughts that doesn't really register in your mind until way later, right? Probably when you came back, before we moved to France. Those two weeks I felt like I was seeing you in a completely different light. I guess 'cause I was so worried that it was the last time we'd see each other, and you really were different than before. Then I realized it wasn't the first time I'd thought that; I'd wanted to kiss you before."

Zoro's eyes tracked slowly down to Sanji's hands, which were fidgeting slightly around his empty bottle of beer.

He took a deep breath, then continued. "I got so pissed off at myself when I finally realized what I was doing with you, not because I knew that I was wrong for hurting you, not just then. I lied to myself, because I liked everything we'd done so much but... I really didn't want to think about being gay. Or being bisexual. Or whatever. You know how when you're a dumb teenager, you kind of internalize all that shit."

Zoro didn't know, but he didn't interrupt; this emotional, talkative drunkenness of Sanji's was one of his favorite things to experience.

"It took me so long after that to come to terms with what we'd done, even longer for me to realize that you hadn't been the one in the wrong. _I_ was, for wanting revenge, for thinking that manipulating your feelings was the way to go about it. Anyway, I guess I was nineteen when I wanted to get it all figured out, whether I had convinced myself that I was into it because I wanted to be accepted by you any way I could, or if there was the possibility that I liked... more than girls. There was a guy in my Wine Essentials class-"

For the first time through Sanji's drunken tirade, Zoro laughed and had to speak. " _Wine Essentials_? The hell is that?"

"I dunno, intro to talking snobby about wine. Anyway, the guy was kinda flamboyant and didn't understand the concept of personal space, but he was really helpful and accommodating, and he set me up on a couple dates. I went out but I never really clicked with anybody. I liked the sex part though, and I liked the way they looked, so I started to process that yeah, I was kind of attracted to guys. But even after I accepted that, I still denied that I liked you."

Zoro tilted his head to the side. The low-grade sloshy feeling he'd acquired over the course of the day was now joined by a looseness of movement and vision somewhat blurred by motion.

"I was afraid because if I'd liked you, then I knew I wouldn't have a chance with you anymore. Not because we lived so far apart but because what I did to you was unforgivable. I still feel like shit when I think about those two weeks. And I still can't believe you'd want to be with me after how awful I was to you. There's not even words for how grateful I am to get a second chance."

"It wasn't like it was completely your fault," Zoro said, suddenly uncomfortable with how candid Sanji was being. It struck too close to the part of him that lingered, always telling him that he'd _deserved_ to be treated the way Sanji had treated him. "I should have been clear about what I felt from the beginning."

"Even if you'd told me that you were serious about me, it wouldn't have changed my mind. I still would have done it to you. You already know how cruel I was." Sanji was looking away from Zoro, seemingly afraid to look at him.

"It's not all so bad these days," said Zoro, trying to lighten the mood. "I mean, I don't _think_ you're with me because you want to get back at me for some perceived superiority complex."

"I wanna be better for you, because I already made the mistake of not realizing what I had until I'd already ruined it," Sanji said, tensely tugging at a hank of hair. "I don't want to see you leave a second time. I don't want to _hurt_ you a second time."

"I'm not leaving," said Zoro. "I'm here to stay. Just try and get rid of me."

Sanji smiled, shaking his head.

Zoro continued, "And you hurt me, yeah, and I hated you for a little while, but it took so much energy and I was forcing it anyway. I didn't actually hate you, I was just upset that you couldn't see how important you were to me. It's not like you could have helped how you felt, you shouldn't have to consider my feelings over yours. You were uncomfortable with it, and it turned you into an asshole, but the point is that it's alright now. I forgive you."

Finally, Sanji's worries seemed to be assuaged, and he crawled over to Zoro's side of the sofa, laying down on top of him. Zoro took the weight easily, stroking his hands down Sanji's back before allowing them to settle on his ass.

"I thought you were gonna fucking _kill_ me when Ace brought you to the Baratie. And when you didn't, I was so shocked about it. I thought there was no way you wouldn't want to kick my ass."

"I wouldn't have kicked your ass over something like that."

"Obviously. After I went back into the kitchen, I swore to myself that I wasn't going to come back out and see you, though. I felt like that ship had sailed, because you seemed so indifferent to me, and I realized what a fucking idiot I was. I'd turned us into strangers. We could have been so much more but we were having awkward small talk. And then I thought, you know what? A part of me would always be curious about what it could have been like. And another part of me wanted to reach and and _take_. So that's why I came back out."

"I'm glad you did," said Zoro. There had never exactly been anything missing from his life, but Sanji added so much to it that it was now impossible to imagine being without him.

"I'm glad too," Sanji said, pressing a kiss to Zoro's neck. "But at the time, even when you told me to come hang out, I was still kinda scared. Especially when I acted like an idiot and started flirting with you to see if you were maybe still interested. I expected you to kick me out on my ass the next morning so that we could go our separate ways. This is a lot more than I could have asked for."

There was silence for a few seconds as Zoro stroked his thumbs up and down over Sanji's hips, and then Sanji spoke again. "You're really considerate, you know. You don't like to show it, but you are, and I really like you. I don't think I'm in love with you yet, but I know I'm going to be someday."

The words, the fact that Sanji wasn't in love him, none of it quite made Zoro's heart sink like it once had. He had to stop and think for a moment about what he felt for Sanji. It was true that he'd always _loved_ him, but did that mean he was _in_ love?

Sanji interrupted him by pressing another kiss to his jawline. "That's not a dealbreaker, is it?"

"No," said Zoro. "It takes time, and we've got that now."

"Good." And then Sanji seemed to be done with talking, lifting his head up so he could get at Zoro's lips. They kissed slowly and leisurely then, chasing each others tongues back and forth as hands wandered without purpose.

Zoro loved when Sanji was like this, not so manic to make progress, and yet suddenly he found himself wanting to _make_ Sanji frantic for it. He used his hands on Sanji's ass to guide him into grinding against his leg until he was moaning, face turned into Zoro's neck. Even though he was perfectly capable of moving on his own, he seemed entirely content to let Zoro manipulate him instead.

His hair tickled against Zoro's face until Zoro got fed up and let out a gust of breath to blow it away. "You need to get this cut," he murmured.

Sanji mouthed at the juncture of Zoro's neck and jaw. "I know," he sighed, hips hitching up longer than was necessary against the friction Zoro was forcing him through. After a second, he crooked his own leg to fit between Zoro's, rocking it against him. "I had an appointment but I had to cancel it because I was too busy."

Zoro hummed distractedly as he focused all his attention onto bringing Sanji off. In their drunkenness, they were a little clumsy, but that seemed to make it all the better. And when they finally came, they weren't nearly as put off by the fact that they'd come in their jeans as they should have been.

"Damn. This was the last pair I had in my bag," Sanji muttered, though he didn't move to peel out of them.

"You should just leave some stuff over here," Zoro said.

"You don't mind?"

"Nah. It'll make it easier for the both of us, that way you can just toss whatever in the laundry and not have to worry about coming to get it after it's washed."

"Okay. I'll bring some spare stuff over next time," said Sanji, and he put his head back down against Zoro's chest for what quickly turned into a nap.

They got back up a little before five and Sanji headed into the kitchen to get dinner going (sure enough, a dish of shepherd's pie that he'd put together earlier in the day after getting sick of listening to Zoro whining about it). Both of them were feeling a little more sober, so they felt it was safe to try and take a shower without braining themselves on something.

After they were all cleaned up, they redressed, Zoro in a pair of boxers and some sweatpants, but otherwise bare-chested, and Sanji into a pair of track pants that had probably belonged to one of Zoro's exes, because they were too small to fit him, plus one of Zoro's ratty hoodies. Then they headed downstairs to get dinner out of the oven, and proceeded to eat it in the living room.

"Oh. There's this charity ball thing for work. I was gonna see if you wanted to come," Zoro said, casually as possible, as they began to tuck in. Truthfully, it had been on his mind most of the weekend, but he hadn't yet figured out how to ask.

"When is it?"

"Last Saturday of the month."

"Yeah, I'll be your date," Sanji replied, smirking at him. "Black tie?"

Zoro nodded.

"Alright. What are you going to wear?"

"Probably my suit from Kuina and Shakky's wedding," Zoro said, swiftly becoming annoyed at having to speak when he could be eating.

"No. No way in hell. We'll go find you a nice one this weekend and I'll have Inazuma get it tailored for you. It's a shame we can't get you something bespoke in time, but this'll have to do..." Sanji said, off on his own tangent now.

Zoro let him go on until he'd worn himself out making plans, nodding at all the appropriate points, and continued to shovel food into his mouth.

When they were done, the plates were put down on the coffee table, and they sat back to finish their drinks. The mid-range buzz Zoro had kept up throughout the day was starting to make him feel a little numb, and he smacked his lips, trying to bring some feeling back. When that didn't work, he decided to take a nap in the hopes that he'd feel better upon awakening.

"We should clean up," said Sanji after a while, making Zoro open his eyes from where they'd drifted shut.

Together, they stared at the massacre they'd made of the coffee table. There were empty plates from breakfast, lunch, and dinner; at least twenty assorted cans and bottles of beer; a choice selection of snacks including sour gummy worms, four different varieties of chips, and a tin apiece of peanuts, almonds, and cashews; two cups of ice cream that Sanji had plowed through earlier in the day; and somewhere underneath all of that were their phones and wallets, and presumably, Sanji's pack of cigarettes.

"We really fucking suck at being adults," said Zoro.

" _You_ suck at being an adult. I was awesome at it before you came along," Sanji said, pushing aside cans until he had his cigarettes. "I'm gonna go have a smoke. You might wanna get cleaning."

Zoro stared at the table and laughed, deciding that it could wait until morning. For now, he was going to go outside and sit beside Sanji. He was going to laugh as Sanji fumbled drunkenly with his cigarettes and watch him pet his strange little stray cat. And most of all, Zoro was going to be thankful that, despite the odds, they'd even ended up here at all.


	13. Fly Me to the Moon

Zoro was going to fall asleep standing up, and that was honestly entirely preferable to being conscious in this awful suit shop for even a moment longer. It was seeming more and more likely that they would, in fact, spend the rest of their lives here.

He _wanted_ to sleep. He _welcomed_ it. If only he could get Sanji to shut up for two minutes.

But even though he thought that exact sentiment very pointedly, very _annoyedly_ in Sanji's direction, the stream of thoughtful muttering from the right of him didn't stop. Zoro cracked an eye open and glared, but Sanji didn't even notice, just continued his staring contest with the two suits sitting on the rack in front of them.

There were only minor differences between them in Zoro's eyes, though Sanji had gone on a tirade about all the things that set them apart, which Zoro had only half listened to. He knew that one was a black tuxedo, and that the other was a charcoal gray three-piece, but the minor nuances were neither apparent to him nor anything he cared to retain knowledge of.

It wasn't like Sanji had even asked his input on the matter (though truthfully, he really didn't have all that much of an opinion), and so maybe he was feeling a little predisposed toward annoyance, even before the half-hour of listening to Sanji's back-and-forth with himself.

It was much like grocery shopping with him: he wanted to assess the quality, the appearance, and for whatever reason, the texture. And he wanted to keep turning to Zoro and thoughtfully raking his eyes over him like he had no idea what Zoro looked like.

"Decision?" Zoro asked, somewhat shortly, after Sanji once again turned to him and stared at a point somewhere around the vicinity of his waist.

"Not yet. I like the tuxedo, personally, but I'm more likely to get you into the three-piece," said Sanji, eyes shifting up to Zoro's to give him a withering look, as if it was Zoro's fault that he hated wearing constrictive clothing.

And while it was a fair point that Zoro had a strong aversion to the tuxedo, at this point he might wear _anything_ if only to get out of this awful place. "I'll wear it," he said.

Sanji's unimpressed look turned to confusion. "Really?"

"Yeah."

"You won't try to get out of it at the last second?"

"I'll do it," Zoro said, utterly determined.

"You should try the other one on to make sure."

"No," said Zoro firmly. "I'll try this one on and then we have to get out of here."

And after twenty minutes of Sanji picking out a shirt, bow tie, and cummerbund, plus another fifteen of Zoro trying the suit on and having to deal with Sanji prodding around finding parts that needed to be hemmed in, they finally left. Zoro had never been more thankful to have Sanji stop touching him.

They stopped off for dinner at a little sandwich shop before parting ways, and by that time, Zoro wondered if it would even be worth it to go work for his shift.

There was a lethargy that filled him at certain times, knowing that even though there was work to do, it rarely led to breakthroughs. He'd learned much about Rayleigh over the past couple days, spending uncountable hours in front of a microfiche reader until his back ached, and occasionally making calls to Shakky, hoping she could fill in blanks.

But almost _anyone_ could have been after Rayleigh; after all, he had been the right hand man of Gol D. Roger right around the time he'd become so prominent and influential that he was considered the king of the city. Silvers Rayleigh was a name almost everyone had known twenty years ago, and there were still more remnants of a past the city would have preferred to forget. There were old members of Roger's own gang sticking about, and even knowing that Rayleigh was highly respected within that circle, it was equally well-known that he had been a harsh disciplinarian of his underlings.

It could have been anyone who still lurked in the shadows of twenty years ago. It could have been his own _gang_ , and Zoro wasn't ruling that out, seeing as Rayleigh had refused to take over after Roger's passing. Maybe someone still harbored ill intent for that.

He couldn't imagine it. Every newspaper article he read, every story Shakky told him, seemed to paint Rayleigh as someone who didn't take shit from anyone, someone who was so fearsome that many men were more frightened of dealing with him than Roger himself. In the end, Zoro had to wonder: who the _hell_ had enough balls to try and kidnap someone like Silvers Rayleigh?

* * *

The majority of the following Friday night was spent on the couch, Sanji forcing Zoro through the first of many 30s Hollywood musicals with too much dancing and not enough action for Zoro's taste. He'd wrongly assumed, at the end of the night, that they were done, but the second he finished breakfast Saturday morning, Sanji tugged him back to the couch for even _more_ movies about dancing.

Of course he knew why Sanji was doing it. It was because Zoro had admitted he was a shitty dancer, and now Sanji was convinced that if they watched enough movies about dancing, Zoro would magically become an expert in the span of a couple hours.

He was dead fucking wrong. Zoro could watch these movies every day for the rest of his life, and he _still_ wouldn't know how to dance. It was useless, and he knew it, and he'd _said_ it more times than he should have had to, but every time Sanji would shush him and tell him to just _watch_.

Frankly, Zoro was sick of Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. If Sanji rewound to the parts he wanted to watch again, or made Zoro pay attention to some minor detail one more time, he was going to go ballistic.

And of course, because Sanji was Sanji and Zoro was Zoro (and thus altogether too weak to Sanji's whims), he let it keep going. He gritted his teeth and weathered through it, because Sanji wanted to, and because he looked so happy about it, and Zoro didn't want that to stop just yet.

It was entirely possible that he was paying more attention to Sanji than he was to the movie, so he had no idea what Sanji was talking about when he finally spoke up. "We could do that."

"Hm?"

Sanji rolled his eyes and grabbed the remote, rewinding back to the beginning of the scene. "Try _watching_ this time."

But as Zoro actually watched the screen, he realized that Sanji thought he was being _modest_ about his dancing skills. "You know... I'm not just _saying_ I can't dance. There's no way in hell I could do that."

"I'd be Fred Astaire, of course," Sanji said, completely ignoring Zoro to go into his fantasy realm. "You can be Ginger Rogers. That dress would look _lovely_ on you."

"I do have the legs for it," Zoro said. He was trying not to laugh, but it was a complete failure. "Not crazy about the heels, though. I think we'll have to call it all off."

"God, would you shut the fuck up?" Sanji asked, though he was laughing too. "You can at least _try_ to dance with me, can't you? Once?"

"How about you call Shakky and Kuina and ask them how many bruises they had on their feet and for how many weeks they had them after dancing with me on their wedding night."

"How is it possible that you have so little coordination that you can't do a simple waltz, or a foxtrot? It's not like you don't have an inordinate amount of control over your body."

"Because I definitely seem like the kind of person who gives a shit about dancing," Zoro said, groaning internally as Sanji rewound the scene yet again.

"You could do it if you wanted to. It's just one night, yeah? You don't have to do it ever again, just pay attention so you don't embarrass yourself tonight."

"If you genuinely think you're going to be able to teach me how to dance in..." He paused to check the time on his phone. "... Four hours, _by a movie_ , you're more delusional than I thought you were."

"Then stand up right now and I'll show you how to dance," said Sanji, pausing the movie and hopping up from the couch, though he tripped on the trailing bottom of his track pants and bumped into the coffee table first.

Grunting, Zoro rolled over into the warm space Sanji had just vacated. "I'm fine right here."

But Sanji wouldn't take no for an answer, because he grabbed Zoro by the arms and tugged on him. Zoro refused to let it happen, hunkering down further into the couch. "Please?" Sanji asked. "I agreed to come with you. The least you can do is give me one shitty _dance_."

"Why do you have to guilt me into everything?" Zoro wondered.

"Because otherwise you wouldn't do anything," Sanji said, and knowing that he'd won, he smirked at Zoro and tugged again, pulling him up off the couch easily.

Zoro stood awkwardly, shifting from foot to foot with his arms at his sides, as Sanji put one hand on Zoro's waist and held the other aloft.

"Now you take my hand..." Sanji said, beginning to look annoyed as Zoro refused to take any cues from him at all.

With a sigh, Zoro lifted his hand and placed it against Sanji's. This was one of very few times he'd ever been nervous in his life, even as absurd as he knew it was to be nervous about dancing with Sanji. It seemed like most moments that caused this effect on him involved Sanji though, and perhaps it was testament to how much Zoro liked him, that he'd continue to force himself through such a useless emotion for his sake.

"Other on my shoulder," Sanji said, and Zoro complied, though still with a heavy dose of trepidation.

"And now when I step forward, you step back." Sanji waited until Zoro had nodded, and stepped forward while Zoro stepped back... right into the edge of the coffee table. He wavered for a moment and only managed to stay up because Sanji's grip tightened around his waist. "Let's try that again without you attempting to fall and brain yourself on any hard surfaces."

Zoro frowned, but they moved the coffee table to the side of the living room, then got into position once more.

For two hours they practiced, with Zoro getting little better than he'd been before, and Sanji only laughing harder and harder at his failures. Halfway through, they switched roles, Zoro leading and Sanji following, and that was even more disastrous, though it made Zoro feel a little less unbalanced.

But at the very least, by the end of it, Zoro knew the steps and the movements, and Sanji was a surprisingly good teacher, even if his temper occasionally flared and he fussed about how Zoro wasn't _listening_ to him properly.

They stopped around four and headed upstairs to start getting ready. Showers were taken, faces were shaved, hair was dried (and styled, in Sanji's case), teeth were brushed, deodorant and cologne were put on. And then it was time to get dressed.

Zoro stared unhappily at the garment bags laying out on the bed. One was his, but he didn't really care to find out which one it was, let alone put on the contents. He'd been frowning at them for a couple minutes when Sanji came out of the bathroom and unzipped the one on the left, pulling out components one after the other.

"What are you waiting for?" Sanji asked as he slid into his dress shirt, seeming to finally notice that Zoro wasn't getting dressed.

"Nothing," said Zoro, and he gave in, unzipping his own garment bag and pulling out his shirt. It took a lot of patience for him to go through every single one of the tiny buttons on it, and he grumbled about it until Sanji, sounding truly irritated for the first time that day, told him to shut up and finish getting ready.

"You're a child," said Sanji as he looked at himself in the full-length mirror, smoothing out the lines of his shirt and pants.

"Says you," Zoro replied lamely.

"Put your pants on."

Zoro did so, somewhat grudgingly, and all the while he watched Sanji. There was an ease and quickness in the way he dressed himself, so once Zoro had gotten his pants and cummerbund on and picked up the bow tie (which he had no idea how to tie), Sanji was already fully dressed.

"You're still not done?" he asked, visible eyebrow raised in disdain.

"No," said Zoro.

"What's the hold-up?"

"Bow tie." As if to prove his point, it came undone and fell off for the fourth consecutive time.

Sanji crossed the room and took the strip of fabric from Zoro, neatly moving it around his neck and tucking it nimbly into place under his collar.

"Why are you so good at this?" Zoro wondered.

"I don't always wear my work uniform, you know. Escoffier said that chefs should wear suits to show their professionalism and respect toward the culinary arts whenever they weren't wearing the jacket and toque," Sanji said. His knuckles kept brushing Zoro's throat as he worked at the bow tie. "I wear one whenever I'm doing any kind of professional cooking things, so I'm wearing one more often than not."

"Is that why you always used to dress up so nice when you were sixteen?" Zoro asked.

A light flush tinted Sanji's cheeks and he shrugged his shoulders, a bashful smile suddenly crossing his face. "That. And sometimes it impressed girls."

Zoro rolled his eyes, and Sanji stepped away after giving the bow tie one final tug. Then Zoro put on his dress shoes and suit jacket, and glanced at himself in the mirror once he was all done.

It wasn't half bad, but not nearly so good that it made up for having to wear something so uncomfortable. He frowned and turned away, heading for the door, but Sanji grabbed him by the wrist and tugged him back.

" _What_ ," Zoro demanded grumpily.

"Just making sure you look alright."

"And?"

Sanji wrinkled his nose. "You're gross."

Somehow, that only made Zoro smile, and he felt his annoyance lighten just a little bit. "Great. Can we go now?"

"Yeah. Don't sound too excited, I might think you actually _want_ to go."

"No way in hell," said Zoro.

* * *

Every single year without fail, the department held the party at the same ballroom in lower Manhattan, and every single year Zoro realized exactly why he hated getting roped into the damned thing: the number of attendees consistently increased, but the venue wasn't getting any bigger.

As they entered the building, Zoro realized that tonight was going to be just as bad as any other year, even if the company was considerably better than it normally was. At the very least, they'd opened up the third floor, so there was hope yet that they wouldn't be bumping into people left and right.

Except the second they actually got into the ballroom, that hope was dashed right against the rocks as Zoro walked face-first into Ace, who was attempting to eat three finger-sandwiches at once while also sipping on a glass of champagne. He grinned at them, mouth full of food.

Sanji let out a groan. "What are _you_ doing here?"

"I'm Smoker's date, although he uh... told me not to call myself his date. Moral support? I don't know."

"Where is he?" Zoro asked.

"Around. Talking business, I guess. Why?"

"Because I plan to stay as far as possible from him tonight. He hates these things," said Zoro, grabbing four glasses of champagne from a passing server. He passed one to Sanji and kept the other three for himself.

"Right. That was pretty easy to tell."

"Uh huh."

"Are we just going to spend the whole party like this?" Sanji butted in.

Zoro grimaced, feeling found out. He wouldn't have minded wasting away the whole night shooting the shit with Ace, but of course Sanji was going to want to dance and do normal party things. "What are the chances that I'm going to get away with it?"

"Slim to none. Let's dance."

"Can I get some food first?" Zoro asked.

"You can get something to tide you over. Then we'll dance," Sanji said firmly.

Figuring that was better than nothing, Zoro nodded goodbye to Ace before heading over to the table laid out at one side of the room, where he gathered up a plate of canapes and cold cuts while Sanji sampled a few of the small pastries. There were several other people lingering by the table, apparently trying to waste time like him. Most of them were people he didn't know, though some he recognized from work, and there was even a certain pair that he knew for a fact weren't supposed to be here at all.

"Hi Zoro!" Luffy called loudly as they made eye contact.

"Luffy. What are you doing here?"

"Ace invited us," said Nami, sipping on her champagne.

"You look lovely this evening," Sanji said to her, fluttering over to examine her dress from all angles.

Zoro rolled his eyes and tossed a smoked sausage in his mouth, leaning against the table with Luffy. "You picked a bad place for a date."

"Yeah. Well, Nami likes to dress up," said Luffy, smiling in her direction as Sanji continued to spout adoration at her. "We thought it would be fun!"

"She's not going to think it's so fun when she goes home with bruises all over her feet."

"Hey," Luffy said, looking wounded and young in the way only he could. "I bet I'm a better dancer than you are!"

"Not hard to top me at that," Zoro muttered, licking a bit of sauce off his fingers and washing it all back with a whole flute of champagne.

"Oh. Did you know Nami's mom is here with some girl?" Luffy asked.

"Nope. Who's she with?"

Luffy pointed across the dance floor to where, sure enough, Bellemere was leading a girl into dance, and as they slowly circled around, Zoro could finally see that the girl was _Tashigi_.

"Woah. She looks a lot like Kuina!" Luffy said.

"Yeah." That knowledge was nothing new to Zoro, but the way Tashigi had pinned her hair up only made the similarities more apparent, and it became clear all over again just why Zoro sometimes felt pained looking at Tashigi.

She and Bellemere were a remarkably elegant pair, though Zoro found himself somewhat surprised that both of them had the coordination to keep up as well as they did. He watched as Bellemere dipped Tashigi, whose blush was obvious even from this distance, then pulled her back up and smiled at her.

"Yeah," said Zoro distantly, not even knowing why he said it, and he tossed another sausage into his mouth.

Nami and Sanji finally deigned to make their return with fresh champagne flutes in their hands. Their eyes glanced to where Zoro and Luffy were still looking, and Nami's face went through several complex emotions before settling on reluctant fondness.

"They look good together. Happy," said Sanji.

"Yeah," Nami said. "Tashigi makes mom really happy, I guess, so I'm willing to overlook the fact that we're only a few years apart."

"I guess I should have seen that coming," said Zoro. "They've been hanging around together a lot lately."

"They've been together for a couple months now. You didn't know?"

"No."

"Oh. Well they have."

Zoro nodded lamely, and barely managed to drain his second glass of champagne before Sanji plucked it from his hand and placed it on the table, then began to drag him toward the dance floor. He glanced back only to see that Nami was smirking at him, and he scowled, knowing she was about to get some serious blackmail material on him.

They fumbled a little as they got into position, Zoro reaching first to lead while Sanji went to do the same, then switching to Sanji attempting to follow while Zoro did the same. Eventually they managed to settle, Sanji leading and Zoro following.

The song that the live band was playing wasn't particularly music for waltzing, but considering that was all Zoro knew, waltzing was what they did. They swayed together slowly while the people around them displayed much more speed, talent, or sheer enthusiasm, but somehow Sanji didn't seem to mind that they weren't showing off.

When the song ended, Zoro tried to pull away, but Sanji held fast to him. "You too scared to dance some more? Worried about embarrassing yourself?"

"No," Zoro said, still trying to pull away.

"Hmph. If you try to leave, then I'll have won this round."

" _Won_?" Zoro asked, suddenly seeing where this was going. And yet even though he knew Sanji was trying to bait him, there was no way he could back down from that kind of challenge. He put his hand on Sanji's shoulder and allowed him to lead them into through another dance, and one more after that, when Sanji finally decided he wanted to take a break to smoke. Zoro watched as he crossed the room, mounted the stairs, and headed out onto the balcony above.

Then he went back to the side of the room with seating, where Tashigi and Bellemere were now resting, both of them glowing a little with sweat under the light.

"Hey," Tashigi said, smiling tiredly up at him. "Where's your date?"

"Hey. He's taking a smoke break."

"He's a handsome one," Bellemere said as she snacked on a cream puff. "You're looking pretty nice yourself tonight."

"Okay," said Zoro, taking a seat on the other side of Tashigi. His eyes fell on the dance floor, where Luffy was swinging Nami around wildly, but she was laughing, so he supposed it wasn't too bad of a time. There were a lot of other couple still going at it out there, some more energetic than others, and many smiling faces.

"Any news on Rayleigh?" Tashigi asked after a while.

"Nope."

"We should be out there _looking_ for him," she said, frustrated.

"We should be enjoying the night, not talking shop," said Bellemere, demolishing yet another cream puff and sucking the remaining cream off her fingers.

"We're doing all we can on both fronts," Zoro said boredly.

"No we're _not_ ," Tashigi hissed.

"He isn't helpless. Neither are we. We'll get him back safely."

"But he's still a civilian! It's still _our responsibility_ to keep him safe, and we've failed that, and now you want to just _sit here waiting_?" Tashigi's voice was getting increasingly loud and frantic. "Zoro, what the hell?"

Zoro took a deep breath and let it out. "I can't magically find him, Tashigi. We have nothing to go on."

"You two, stop. Even though we're at a police function, there's civilians all around," Bellemere said, putting on her authoritative voice. "These things can be discussed in the privacy of the office, nowhere else. I'm not going to force either of you to have fun tonight, but you _are not allowed_ to speak about confidential cases here."

Tashigi's mouth snapped shut and she gazed down at her knees. Zoro simply turned away, thankful at least that they didn't have to get into this tonight.

After a moment, he stood, sick of feeling the anger radiating off of Tashigi. "Sanji's been gone awhile, I'm going to go check on him."

"Sure," Bellemere said. Her normal, pleasant demeanor had returned, and she smiled at him. "Have a good night, Detective."

"You too, Lieutenant. Tashigi." He offered them a wave, then headed up the stairs and out onto the balcony.

Sanji was still there, leaned up against one of the stone railings with a cigarette between his fingers. Upon closer inspection, it had burned down to the filter.

"Where did you get off to?" Zoro asked, brushing a hand down Sanji's back, which felt uncomfortably rigid.

"I saw somebody I knew," Sanji replied. He looked a little startled, eyes wide and mouth slightly open as if in shock.

"Somebody you know in a bad way?"

"Yeah... something like that." Sanji leaned to the side and into Zoro, who took the weight with ease.

"Ace?"

Sanji looked confused for a moment, but then he let out a half-hearted laugh. "No."

"Who?"

"Just a... uh... an ex." He sounded unsure about that, and Zoro became immediately suspicious, but he was much more concerned with how uneasy Sanji was than with whether or not he was lying.

"Are you alright?"

"No. But I will be," Sanji said as he leaned harder into Zoro.

"Okay. What do you need?"

"Huh?"

"What do you need? A drink? A cigarette? To leave? Tell me."

"I just need a moment. And a cigarette, probably."

Zoro reached into Sanji's jacket and fished out his packet of cigarettes and a lighter, holding one out. Sanji took it with shaking fingers, and Zoro lit it for him once he'd put it in his mouth.

For a while, Sanji was silent, holding the smoke deep within his lungs before releasing it with a sigh. "We should go to the cherry blossom festival at the Botanical Gardens," he said.

"Is that what you want to do for your birthday trip?" Zoro asked, sliding his fingers through Sanji's hair. They caught on a strand, and he tugged them loose before he could think that it'd hurt Sanji, who winced.

"That's not really a trip." The look of pain had disappeared to be replaced with a petulant frown, which almost concealed the still-frantic part of him that lurked beneath. "It's still in Brooklyn. We have to go far away for it to be a trip."

"Hm. Alright. Still no idea where you want to go?"

"No. I guess we'll get it figured out eventually."

"Yeah."

They stood quietly on the balcony until Sanji had finished his first cigarette and lit another. The night air was just cool enough, and a little breezy, and it ruffled the strands of Sanji's hair and set Zoro's earrings tinkling together. Music from inside drifted up the stairs and out through the open balcony doors, and Sanji started swaying against Zoro.

He let it happen, wanting Sanji to do anything it took to calm himself down. And when he eventually got drawn into the hypnotic shift of Sanji's movement, he didn't force himself to stop.

"Do you want to head back in now?" Sanji asked, once he'd finished his third cigarette.

"No," said Zoro, still not entirely convinced that Sanji was alright.

"I don't care. Let's go."

"It's fine if you need another minute to stop crying," said Zoro.

Sanji very nearly snarled at him. "Nothing's even _wrong_ , you're just assuming something is."

Zoro knew what he'd seen: the wild, frightened look in Sanji's eyes, the way his mouth was stuck down in a frown, and the hunched, tense posture he held. Not only that, but Sanji was being awfully defensive and secretive. Something was wrong, but if he kept pressing, he knew Sanji would only get more angry, and he didn't want that.

So he relented, and they headed back inside, down the stairs to where several people had now called it a night despite the fact that it was only about eight. Bellemere and Tashigi were back to dancing, and now Nami and Luffy were stood at the refreshments table. Ace was nowhere to be seen, but Smoker was helping himself to a plate of snacks. With a nudge to get Sanji's attention, Zoro led the way toward him.

"Roronoa," Smoker greeted as they stepped up beside him. Then he turned to look at Sanji, and his mouth twisted down a little more than it usually did. "Annoying flirtatious one."

"Sanji Black," said Sanji, seeming thoroughly unruffled.

"I know your name. I'm just not all that bothered with usin' it."

"Has anyone ever told you that you sound like you belong on Jersey Shore?" Sanji asked, grabbing a champagne flute off a passing server.

"That'd be cute if I was actually from Jersey," said Smoker.

"Really? Could have fooled me."

"And I assume everyone thinks your little French accent is just _darling_ ," Smoker said, his fingers groping inside of his suit jacket for something, but he pulled back a moment later, empty-handed and scowling.

Sanji's cheeks flushed a little, but his scowl only deepened. "I don't have an accent."

Zoro said nothing, but Smoker was right. It wasn't always there - just certain words that Sanji would say that sounded so foreign at times he barely even knew what Sanji was saying. And Zoro never called him out on it because he sort of liked it, the way Sanji's words would trip over the barest trace of an accent and then go right back to the same nondescript Midwestern accent that Zoro was used to. He wondered if it came from growing up with Zeff, who had a strong French accent that only got stronger as he became annoyed or drunk.

"Anyhow. It's good to see that you showed up," said Smoker gruffly, turning to Zoro. "I'm glad I don't have to chew you out this year."

"Nope, you don't."

"I'd better go do some mingling. You could do the same if you really wanted to get on my good side."

"I don't care about being on your good side," said Zoro.

"Whatever, kid. Just don't step on any of the higher-up's toes. Fuckin' Sakazuki's even here tonight, it's anybody's guess as to why he wanted to come out with the lower folk. So you might wanna try and stay away from him if you can manage it."

Sanji shifted beside him uncomfortably, fingers tapping on his empty glass. He still looked distressed, but more bored than anything.

"Uh huh. We'll do that," said Zoro. Smoker nodded and turned away from them, glaring out across the floor before heading upstairs. Zoro followed his previous line of sight and finally discovered where Ace had gotten off to - dancing with some dark-haired girl. He smiled and shook his head. Jealousy was so unlike Smoker, but amusing to see nonetheless.

Eventually Sanji led him back to the dance floor, and though Zoro was basically done for the night in regards to dancing, he let Sanji keep him going through so many jazz standards that Zoro thought he was going to drop by the end of it. It was already past eleven when he finally got a chance to look at his phone, and his tiredness seemed to fully catch up with him all at once.

He looked around. Almost everyone was gone, including Smoker and Ace, Nami and Luffy, and Bellemere and Tashigi. But there was the band, and some stragglers, and sure enough, Sakazuki, who he'd managed to avoid for the entirety of the night. He didn't intend to break that streak now, so he led Sanji up the stairs and out to the balcony again.

It was even cooler out, a severe contrast to how hot and sweaty Zoro felt after dancing. He tugged on his bow tie, though Sanji reached over and smacked his hand away.

"Don't ruin it for me yet," he said.

"Why?"

"Because you look so hideous I just can't get enough of it," Sanji said, smiling widely at him as he fished a cigarette out of its pack, tucked it between his lips, and lit it.

"Same to you."

Sanji laughed, smoke spewing out of his mouth. "At least I know how to wear one."

"You do," Zoro admitted as he leaned his back against the balcony. The light caught against Sanji's back, turning him into a dark, well-dressed silhouette that occasionally leaked smoke.

"Come dance with me one more time," Sanji said after he'd put his cigarette out in the ash urn.

"There's no music."

"If you listen a little harder, I think you'll find that there is." Sanji held an arm aloft, patiently waiting for Zoro to come and take it.

With a sigh, Zoro crossed the balcony to Sanji and took his offered hand, the other going on his shoulder as Sanji's came around his waist.

They began to sway slowly, and Zoro found that as he opened up his ears, he _could_ hear the music. It was some Frank Sinatra song that Sanji sometimes had playing in his apartment, often enough that it was recognizable to Zoro but not so often that it was irritating to listen to.

And then, as they rocked side to side, Sanji began to sing, and Zoro found himself completely stunned. Of course Sanji hummed as he cooked, but Zoro had never heard him sing, and he found that he wanted to hear more of it. His singing voice was much the same as when he spoke, low and tinged with an edge of smoky roughness, but there was a lilting and lyrical quality to it, and the bass of it vibrated through Sanji's chest and into Zoro's.

It was pleasant, and Zoro found that he minded having to dance much less now that he could close his eyes and listen to Sanji singing. Yet again, it was one of those moments that simply felt perfect just the way it was, even taking into account the loudness of the city and Zoro's sweatiness and the fact that his feet ached. And as the song ended, he was almost disappointed that Sanji stopped singing and stepped away from him.

"Do you want to head home now?" Sanji asked.

"Sure."

They headed back inside, and even when they nearly bumped into a very angry Sakazuki on the way down the stairs, Zoro's good mood couldn't be deterred.

* * *

The first thing they did upon getting inside was to shuck off their shoes and trail barefooted into the kitchen for an actual substantial dinner, which turned out only to be leftover pizza from earlier in the week. Afterward, they sat on the couch with the TV off and the lights dim, jackets off, but still not the bow tie or cummerbunds.

"I had a good time tonight," said Sanji.

Zoro hummed in half-agreement. Parts of it had been fun, mostly the ones that involved Sanji, but the rest of it had been forgettable, and he wasn't altogether upset about that fact.

"Smoker's kinda funny," Sanji continued.

"I guess that's one way of putting it."

"You don't think so? He's a little like you. Acts all big and bad, but he's not that intimidating in the end."

"I'm intimidating," said Zoro noncommittally.

"You think you are."

"I _know_ I am."

"How many suspects have ever actually been frightened by you? How many of them caved under pressure?"

"Lots."

"So you go out of your way to intimidate them?"

Zoro raised an eyebrow. He didn't want to talk about this, but he also didn't want to back down from Sanji. "Sometimes you have to."

"No you don't. I think you just _want_ to. To prove a point, that you're stronger than them."

Zoro said nothing, lips pressed together tightly. This had gone downhill rather fast, and he wished he could have picked some magical choice that would have kept them out of such territory.

"I'm just saying. Maybe you ended up on the wrong side of life," Sanji continued.

"If you're going to start this whole _policework is for idiots_ thing again, I don't want to hear it," Zoro said. "I had enough of that when we were teenagers."

Sanji went silent, frowning. "I... sorry. I didn't mean it like that, you know. It's your life, of course you do what you want to. I just wish I understood what pushed you down this path when you could have done something else to help others without working with _those_ kind of people."

"It's not your fucking business," said Zoro. His voice was calm, but his tone was dead serious. "And even if it was, I don't owe you anything. Why don't _you_ tell me why you lied to me earlier tonight about that _ex_? Oh, it's because there was no ex. It was something else. Do you know how I could tell? Because there was no one we got close to that you tried to avoid tonight. No one you kept looking at, to make sure they were far away." He knew he was changing the subject, and in truth, he was guilty. Because he kept secrets - so many of them - from Sanji, and he knew he had no right to demand that Sanji tell him the truth about everything. But he wanted to know, and the more these things piled up, the less sure he was that he could go on telling himself that it was alright, that Sanji was _allowed_ these things.

And Sanji went quiet, but it wasn't an angry quiet, not the kind of quiet furiousity that Zoro was holding onto right now. It was the quiet of someone who knew he'd been found out, and was trying to decide if it was worth it to keep up a front. A stewing, thoughtful kind of quiet.

That dissolved quickly though, and Sanji's mouth turned down, his eyes flashed, and Zoro could tell he was pissed. "I don't owe _you_ anything," he said, mimicking Zoro's earlier words. "I've been acting like I do all this time, and you know what? What I did to you was terrible and I don't expect you to ever forgive me for it, but I'm not going to deal with you holding it over my head."

"Who's holding anything over your head? Do you honestly think I would have just _given into you_ if I wasn't over it?"

"Do you want the honest answer to that?" Sanji asked vindictively.

"Yeah. Tell me _honestly_ that you think I'm a fucking doormat, since you seem to think I'm not intimidating at all."

"You're not a _doormat_ ," Sanji said. "But you sure used to act like one."

Fuck, he didn't want to talk about this. He didn't want to think about how stupid he'd been back then, he didn't want to go over it again. "I never let you walk all over me."

"But you did! And you should have made me stop!"

"Don't pin the blame on me for your own cruelty! You knew perfectly well what you were doing. In fact, I don't know what the hell makes you think I could have convinced you to stop being such an asshole. Johnny told me you wouldn't listen to him or your dad."

"That's... I was just a fucking stupid teenager! And I'm doing so good at being better to you!"

"Yeah, you are. So I don't see why this is suddenly such a big problem."

"Because I wish you'd just... I don't know. Punch me or something, so we can be even. I wish you'd care about yourself."

"I _do_ care about myself."

"No you don't. You do something you hate because you don't want to admit you were wrong about it. And what about going after that guy and nearly getting yourself killed? You don't take care of yourself!"

"I'm doing just fine," Zoro said calmly. "And I decide what I've done wrong in my life. Not you."

"You can do better than this. This is pitiful. You fucking- Fuck it." Sanji tossed his hands up exasperatedly and shook his head. "Just take some time to think about it, please?" And then he spun on his heel and left the living room, shuffling around in the hallway before Zoro heard the front door open and slam closed again.

Their first fight, and it seemed to have happened in a flash before either of them could do anything to stop fanning the flames. Zoro stared at the wall, rubbing a hand over his mouth frustratedly. Things had seemed so right earlier in the evening, and he hadn't known this weighed so heavily on Sanji's mind - both the incident from all those years ago and the way Zoro acted over his job.

Their first _actual_ fight, not a play one, not a disagreement. Flat-out yelling and anger and frustration. But they hadn't broken up. Sanji hadn't _said_ that he didn't want to see Zoro again and honestly, this wasn't anything compared to the fights they used to have. But it held more weight, more meaning, and it had a lot more potential to ruin this than any of the fights they had as teenagers. It ate him up inside, both the anger and the worry, and when he eventually fell asleep on the couch, it was only from blessed exhaustion.

* * *

He didn't speak to Sanji on Sunday, partially because he had to work, and partially because he just wasn't sure what to say yet. Furthermore, he was still angry, and he hadn't actually taken any time to think about what Sanji had asked him to; in fact, he was still rather confused about what Sanji had even wanted him to think about in the first place.

Monday he worked too, and though it was Usopp's birthday, he was spending it with Kaya rather than having a get-together. On top of that, Brook's birthday was just a couple days later, and he was having a birthday dinner that Zoro was half-glad he couldn't attend due to said work, because he knew Sanji would be there, and honestly, Zoro's pride was still a little wounded.

He didn't want to be the first one to cave, and he knew Sanji would be just as stubborn, and that meant any amount of time could pass before they really _talked_ about it.

It wasn't until the following weekend that he began to actually miss Sanji enough that he considered apologizing, though for what, he had no idea. Work and sleep were good ways to forget about their fight for periods of time, but there were still lulls, and on his days off, it became more apparent than ever exactly what was missing in his home.

On Sunday, in an attempt to distract himself, he spent the day doing laundry and his version of cleaning the house, then got dressed and ate out for dinner since he was sick of the horrible things his kitchen had to offer.

He went straight on to work after that, and in the early hours of Monday morning, immeasurably bored, he finally decided that he was going to call Sanji and make things right. He picked up his phone, and was even about to dial Sanji's number when the phone on his desk beeped and Tashigi came over the intercom.

"Zoro?"

With a sigh, he put his cell phone down and picked up the receiver instead. "What's up?"

"We need to get down to the hospital."

"Why?"

"Firefight. Seven dead and nine injured."

Zoro's heart began pounding in his chest, and he grabbed his jacket off the back of his chair. "I'll be up in a minute."

Less than twenty seconds later, he met Tashigi at the side door and together, they headed for the patrol car. He was almost thankful for the upcoming distraction, because it wasn't until that moment that he realized he'd only be proving Sanji right if he came crawling back first. And even if it hurt to be away from him, he wasn't going to let Sanji smash his pride apart again.


	14. We Can Work It Out

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, I am so, so sorry for the lack of updates the past couple months. I was out of town and then I was burned out from writing all the time, so I needed a little mental break. Because I'd like to avoid that happening again, updates will be coming more on a monthly basis than an every other week basis. Sorry about that. I'm no less dedicated to the story and getting it finished, it just might take a little longer than anticipated. And that's the state of things.
> 
> Additionally, I forgot to mention that as of last chapter, we're about a third of the way through Full Disclosure! Thanks for sticking with me so far.

In the car on the way to the hospital, Tashigi had given Zoro as quick a rundown of the situation as she could, but all that really amounted to was that she believed the firefight was between the Joker's gang and someone else, unknown as of yet.

Sure enough, the first two bodies they looked at in the morgue were easy enough to identify as the Joker's lackies, what with that crossed-out smiling face of a signature tattooed across various body parts. Both of the men had a couple bullets through their chests, though Zoro could tell that the second bullet hadn't been necessary for either of them; it was clear that it was merely insurance, to be entirely certain that the first bullet had really gotten the job done.

But the third body was different. It was a woman's, for one thing, and instead of a smiley, there was a tattoo of a boa constrictor wrapped up her legs and around her waist. She too had been shot, though her body was somewhat more gory than the other two. It was riddled through with bullets in non-vital areas, and most likely, she'd died a long, slow death.

"The Joker should have taught them to aim better," Zoro said, not even bothering to repress the dark amusement in his voice.

Tashigi smacked him on the arm and scowled at him. "These were people with families, no matter how bad they were. Don't be so disrespectful."

"Sorry," he muttered as they moved along down the row, checking the remaining four bodies, which were, lately, more of the Joker's flunkies. "Got an ID on any of these?" he asked, once they'd reached the end.

The lab technician, a shriveled but spry old man who had been hovering over them since their arrival, nodded and gestured to a tray of wallets sitting on a nearby counter. "All of the bodies but two have been claimed so far."

"What's the hold-up on them?" Tashigi asked.

"No answer at their homes. The intern left messages, hopefully they'll get back to us. Um. Is there anything else I can help you with? I've really got to get back to this body."

"Go on," Zoro said, waving him off.

The man scuttled away into one of the freezer rooms, and Zoro turned to Tashigi. After one last check of the bodies and a moment to make sure they had everything they needed, they headed for their next stop.

At this time of night, the elevators were fairly empty, and they stood in silence as they took one up to the ICU. The night shift nurse sitting at the front desk was clearly about to fall asleep, but she perked up when they approached, and drooped yet again after informing them that their other perpetrators were probably asleep, and not to be disturbed, if so. She was, however, willing to give them limited information about the culprits, and the room numbers they needed.

Zoro and Tashigi made their way down the hallway slowly. As expected, most of the rooms were dim and relatively quiet, aside from the last one, in which there was a young woman with bandages wrapped all across her upper body, propped up in bed as she watched TV. A tattoo of a rattlesnake was clearly visible on her arm.

"Marguerite?" Tashigi asked, pushing the door open a little.

"Yes," the woman confirmed. Her eyes scanned up and down Tashigi and Zoro, presumably taking in their uniforms, and a look of resignation overtook her face. "I assume you're going to want to arrest me."

"Not until you're well enough to leave," Zoro said. "There are guards outside your doors in the meantime, to make sure you don't try to check out on us."

"We just want to ask some questions for now," said Tashigi.

Marguerite gave them an unconcerned look, but gestured to the two chairs near her bedside. "Sit down then."

"About this firefight..." Zoro began, once he and Tashigi had sat.

"Hm?"

"You took them all down when there were three times as many of them as there were of you," Zoro said, shifting uncomfortably in the hard plastic chair. "I'm actually kind of impressed."

She smiled wanly and smoothed her hands over the sheets in an absent gesture. "They're a bunch of street thugs. We have skills."

"Of course you do. Wanna tell us why you had to put them to use?" he asked.

The mild expression on her face slipped just a little, hardening into seriousness. "They're bad men. I don't have to tell you that."

"Some might say you're bad too."

"Admittedly, our ways are... unorthodox. But we don't _hurt_ people. We _help_ them."

Zoro sighed and leaned forward, shaking his head. "Alright. Say you do. How was shooting up a bunch of the Joker's thugs _helping_ anyone?"

"It's entirely possible you've started a war," Tashigi added, sounding strained. She had been writing hurriedly in her notebook as Zoro asked questions, but now her eyes looked solemnly upon Marguerite. "And that's not something that only affects the two at war. It'll hurt civilians too. That's not _helping_."

"You know what his gang does. They don't have any morals. Selling awful drugs to people, to _children_. And they've been quiet for a while, but all of a sudden the Human Auction reopens and they're swarming all over the place, and there's kidnappings. That can't be a coincidence! You might not let it go to the public but we _know_!"

"Do you have any evidence of their supposed kidnappings?" Zoro asked.

"No, but..."

"But?"

"But we know it's them! It has to be them!"

Zoro grimaced. "That's not enough to help us. We can't do it just because you don't think it could be anyone else. This can't turn into a witch hunt."

She frowned at him, and turned her head away. "I'm tired now. I think I'd like to rest."

"Ma'am-" Tashigi said, putting her hands up in a placating gesture.

"I'd like to rest," Marguerite repeated, and pressed the button to call a nurse.

"We still have questions for you," said Zoro, injecting every ounce of authority into his voice that he could muster, which was quite a lot, considering.

"I don't feel up to answering them."

"I don't give a shit how you feel-"

"Zoro-" Tashigi said, pulling at his sleeve.

"In a minute."

"Zoro, I really think we should leave," she insisted, tugging even harder at him.

Turning, Zoro saw a large, annoyed-looking man wearing scrubs, and he sighed, knowing it was better to give in. "Alright, we'll come back for you later."

"Please don't," said the nurse, grimacing as he shooed them out of the room. "I think you've done enough for the day. Try again tomorrow."

* * *

"I got a call from your sister-in-law. She said Rayleigh is back, safe and sound," Tashigi said the next day, popping unannounced into Zoro's office.

Zoro tilted his eyes up to look at her. He had his head on the desk, attempting to nap through his lunch break, but for some reason, sleep just wasn't coming. "Huh. Imagine that."

She smiled. "Yeah. Imagine that. One less thing to worry about."

"Yeah."

"Alright, what's your deal?" she asked, raising one eyebrow.

"What do you mean?"

"You've just been... _off_ the past week. Mopey one second and aggressive the next. What's the deal?"

"Nothing."

She sat down on the corner of his desk and passed him a folder, so he assumed that she was done attempting to engage him in conversation. But before he could see what she'd brought to him, she spoke again. "You haven't received very many calls or texts lately."

Zoro didn't acknowledge her, instead turning his gaze down as he opened the folder. Inside were basic profiles on the dead and hospitalized gang members, and he scanned over them distractedly. Having her hover around was almost as irritating as all this dumbass fighting with his dumbass boyfriend.

"Did you and Sanji break up?" Tashigi finally blurted out.

_Speak of the devil_ , he thought, and he could just _feel_ his face giving away his feelings. Worry (and perhaps pity) set Tashigi's features and she leaned toward him, holding her arms out; he didn't know what she was going to do, but whatever it was, he didn't want it, so he shuffled awkwardly back in his chair. "We didn't."

"So then what's the deal?" she asked, dropping her arms back at her sides. The worry was still evident on her face, but less so now.

"We had a fight, I guess," Zoro said. He picked through the files, hoping it would divert her back toward the topic of work, but he paused on seeing the face of one of the dead men. "Hey... this guy."

Tashigi ignored him. "Are you two trying to work it out at all?"

"This was one of the guys who kidnapped Rayleigh," Zoro said.

"Huh?" Tashigi finally seemed to let go of her line of questioning, and peeked over the edge of the folder to see the man he was talking about. "Crud. That means Marguerite was right."

Zoro wasn't concerned about being right or wrong. What he _was_ concerned about was that the next page he flipped to was the _other_ man who had participated in the kidnapping. And that meant that every single person who had been involved with Rayleigh's disappearance was now dead. He felt suddenly lost, yet at the same time, a connection was beginning to form in his mind. "You have to be thinking it too," he said after a moment.

"What?" Tashigi asked, clearly confused.

"There were only four of the Snake Princess' people there. And twelve of the Joker's. How the _hell_ did four of them manage to kill six of the Joker's, while only losing one of themselves?"

Tashigi tilted her head to the side thoughtfully. "Marguerite said they were skilled."

"But look at their information. None of them were in the military. They weren't bodyguards. They weren't in the police. One of them is an amateur boxer, but let's remember this was a firefight. And none of them even have gun licenses. As far as we know, they have no training at all."

"They must. It couldn't be sheer dumb luck that got them here," Tashigi said, and then she nodded slowly. "So they had to have been trained. Who trained them?"

"I don't know, but I've got my suspicions. Don't you think it's a bit strange that these guys were targeted? Marguerite's people could have gone for anyone else - you know, high ranking members of the Joker's gang, people whose deaths would actually have an impact. So why them?"

"Revenge?" Tashigi asked, playing along with him.

"Yeah. She specifically mentioned kidnapping. I don't think it's a coincidence; I think Marguerite knows Rayleigh, I think he taught them to shoot so that they could get revenge for him, and I think we need to see her again."

"But before we do that, _you_ need to talk to Sanji."

He rolled his eyes.

"Or at least go home and get some sleep... You've been working really hard lately. And I know you haven't been going back home all that much, because I came in this morning and you were sleeping on Smoker's couch before he got in."

Guiltily, he rolled his chair across the floor to hide behind his computer. "It's fine."

"If you're refusing to go back to your own home just to avoid him, I don't think it is."

"Whatever," he said. While she was talking, he'd started up a game of solitaire, and was currently failing miserably at it. "Hey. You love your job, right?"

"Huh? Well, of course I do. I mean, it's hard and emotionally draining... but there's nothing like the satisfaction of helping people, right? I think I gain more from it than I lose," Tashigi said, staring intently at him. "Why do you ask?"

"Dunno. I was just curious."

"Right... Okay, I'm gonna take a lunch break, then let's see what we can figure out."

"Sure."

* * *

Later that evening they stopped by the hospital again, but the nurse that had shown them out last time curtly informed them that Marguerite was asleep and wouldn't be taking visitors for the night, and so they ended up back at the station, empty-handed.

As he headed down the hallway toward his office, Zoro thought about taking a break for dinner before coming back and working a little overtime in a vain attempt to avoid home some more, so he didn't immediately register the familiar figure sitting at his desk once he stepped into his office. But when he did, he went on his guard immediately. "What are you doing here?"

Sanji shifted in the chair and looked up at Zoro with neutral eyes. "You haven't been at home."

"Haven't been at _my_ home."

"Yes," Sanji said, frowning a little. "That's what I meant."

Zoro didn't know what to say now that he was confronted with Sanji. He wanted more than anything to be angry that Sanji had gone this long just ignoring the fight between them, but he was just as guilty, and that made him even more angry. "Well? What do you want?"

Sanji bristled and dug his fingers into the arm of the chair. "I _wanted_ to bring you dinner and see if you were ready to stop being an asshole. Obviously that was asking for too much."

"Oh, _I'm_ the asshole here?"

"Yeah, dumbass."

"You might want to practice apologizing if this is the best you can come up with."

"I'm not here to apologize!"

"Well why the fuck not? You're the one in the wrong."

"Fuck you!"

Zoro strode quickly forward, not stopping until he could grab Sanji by the shoulders and shake him a little. "Fuck _you_ , it's my life," he said, too lost in anger to come up with a decent comeback. "You have no say in it."

"I don't think it's too unreasonable for me to have concerns," said Sanji, pushing Zoro's hands off as he stood. His face had contorted from its usual handsome (if slightly haughty) blankness and into something almost animalistic in its defensiveness.

"You don't get to dictate what I do," Zoro said dangerously. His hands were beginning to shake where they rested at his sides.

"I'm not trying to do that. Shit, I asked you one fucking question and you act like I'm the most overbearing person in the world or something. Is it so awful of me to want to know that you're happy?"

"You know that's not what this fight is about."

"Then what is it, why are you so defensive, why are we still _fighting_ about whatever it is? Are you just pissed because you know I'm right?"

"That's not your business."

Sanji made a noise of pure fury and swung his right leg up, catching Zoro hard in the chest and knocking him back into his desk, which skidded several feet toward the wall. A stack of papers fluttered off and scattered across the floor, but neither of them even noticed as their argument quickly escalated into a hands-versus-leg fight, to which the only soundtrack was hard flesh against flesh impact and pained grunts.

They kept it up for as long as anger could sustain their bodies, and then, sudden as it had come on, it ended. Sanji collapsed on the desk, glaring from beneath his curtain of hair, mouth twisted down, and Zoro swayed in place above him.

Neither of them said anything as they stared at each other, feeling out the aura of the room. There was still anger, and the tension was almost worse than before, but it was different too. Less like they were waiting for the clash and more like neither of them knew what to do now.

It seemed they had the same idea at the same moment, because as Zoro leaned down, Sanji leaned up. Their mouths banged together painfully, but it didn't deter them; instead, Zoro licked up the first drop of blood that spilled, unsure if it came from his mouth or Sanji's. Soon it didn't matter anyway, because Sanji was biting roughly at his bottom lip until Zoro felt it split open, and even then the only thing that stopped them from kissing was when Sanji reached down between them and began to shove frantically at Zoro's pants.

"Wait," Zoro said firmly, drawing his mouth away.

"What?" Sanji asked, annoyed. "You better not say we have to talk this out now, because-"

"No supplies."

Sanji paused and dug around in his front pocket, pulling out his wallet, from which he retrieved a condom and a small packet of lube.

Zoro snatched them away and tugged Sanji's pants and underwear down around his knees, fighting them over one of his all-too-fancy shoes so that it hung off. Then he came back with his fingers covered in lube, roughly and quickly prepping Sanji with shaking fingers, and at last, he rolled the condom on, slicking it up.

With no preamble, he pressed inside, Sanji gritting his teeth in what might have registered as pain if Zoro had been in a less frantic state of mind. But he wasn't, and by the time he was fully inside, Sanji's face had once again smoothed out.

They had never fucked like this, which wasn't to say that they were never rough, but that it had never before been an extension of anger. It was clear, unforgettable that they were fighting, because when Zoro shoved Sanji's knee up, he didn't care if the stretch was uncomfortable for him. And Sanji had dug his short nails into Zoro's back so hard that he actually wanted to arch away from the feeling.

But he didn't. Instead, he reciprocated that ferociousness in full, nigh ruthless in the snap of his hips as he worked up a rhythm, until Sanji's head fell back on the desk and his mouth opened. He looked like he was about to scream, so Zoro slapped his hand down over his mouth. Dark blue eyes slitted open to glare at him, and teeth bit down hard on his palm, but he didn't pull back, not until he was sure that Sanji had swallowed the sound.

Then he returned his hands to Sanji's hips, rucking up his shirt so that he could press his fingers in tight over the fox on either side of his waist, just enough of a grip to pull Sanji down onto his cock. In that moment, he was selfish, and he didn't allow himself to feel bad for it, because Sanji was just as desperate for it, clawing into him with one hand and arching over the desk, taking anything that was thrown at him.

He worked frantically against Zoro, face slack with pleasure as he pressed up into his own fist, and even if this whole situation made Zoro feel guilty and somewhat sad that he was having it like this, rough and almost uncaring, he wanted Sanji to feel good. The best way he knew to do that was to pull out and shove Sanji (who went rather willingly) over onto his stomach before pushing back in, palm hard against the small of his back.

Zoro hated this position. It made him feel powerful over Sanji in a way he didn't want to, trusted in a way he wasn't sure he should be. He knew too that Sanji _did_ like it, and sure enough, he was pushing back onto Zoro as soon as he got his bearings, one hand snaked under his stomach to jerk himself toward completion. It was a sight Zoro could never get sick of, so he set to work, leaning forward as he thrust into Sanji, digging his teeth into the back of that pale neck.

The effect was instantaneous. Sanji cursed hoarsely and reared back against Zoro's mouth, the fingers of his free hand scrabbling over the slick surface of the desk. All Zoro could do was hang onto his hips and suck at any skin he could get his mouth on, but Sanji wasn't having any of that; he turned his head, dark blue eyes glaring hazily at Zoro, mouth wet and bitten, and Zoro couldn't do anything but fiercely press their lips together.

Sanji's free hand released its newfound clutch on the edge of the desk and came up to twist through Zoro's spikey hair, pulling him even closer. The kiss was something uncomfortable, searingly hot, bitingly frantic, with no holds barred, and the slick movement of tongues and lips coming roughly together and apart again made it all the more reminiscent of a fight. Breath was lost and regained, blood was spilled, and it _hurt_.

Neither of them disliked giving and receiving that pain, and they goaded each other into taking it further. Zoro's fingertips left bruises down Sanji's spine that day, left shadows between the flowers tattooed on Sanji's back, left the fox imprinted with its own dark spots. And when Sanji's body finally shuddered and tightened, and there was the soft pattering of come on the surface of the desk, Zoro let himself go too. His fingers pressed even harder into Sanji's flesh as he saw himself through, and when he pulled out, his whole body felt drained and tired.

Sanji stayed where he was for a few moments, back heaving as he regained his breath. Zoro took in the sight of him - it was undeniably attractive, but he felt ashamed of himself, and that didn't go away when Sanji stood up unsteadily and began to dress himself, saying nothing.

The voice that came out of Zoro was wrecked in a way that had nothing to do with the sex. "If I hurt you or did anything you didn't want me to do..." _Then fucking toss me to the side_ , he thought, but didn't say.

Sanji didn't smile at him, but his voice was soothing, and his eyes were serious. "You didn't do anything I didn't want you to do." He righted his wrinkled shirt and pulled his slacks back up, then brushed his hair away from his face. "I have to go. And not that I'm complaining, but I had been hoping we could get this worked out before the end of my dinner break. See ya."

Zoro watched silently as Sanji strode out of his office, letting the door fall shut behind himself. He righted his own clothes before heading out into the hallway, where Tashigi was sitting in the chair next his door. She cleared her throat, and he was ashamed to admit that he jumped.

"I'm not going to say anything to you," she said, pointedly looking at the magazine in her hands. He could see that there was a faint blush over the tops of her cheekbones, and he felt the shame dig just that much deeper into his gut. "Just... work it out with him, okay? Don't let this kind of thing keep happening."

Zoro cleared his throat and nodded. "Did you need something?"

She stood, tucking the magazine into her purse. "No. Just wanted to check on you. You should go home soon, okay? And you know, you're lucky Smoker wasn't here for that whole... display."

In horror at the very thought, Zoro choked on his own spit and coughed loudly, pounding at his chest.

"Bye! Have a nice night!" she called back, laughing as she headed for the front doors.

He sat there for a couple minutes longer, contemplating the idea of going home, but ultimately decided against it, so he headed back into his office. As he stepped in, the sight of a brown paper bag sitting on the side table caught his eye, and when he opened it, he found a few tupperware containers holding the dinner Sanji had brought over for him. He felt miserable. It made him all the more determined to _really_ fix things.

* * *

The next day, the angry nurse was off-duty, and so Zoro and Tashigi finally got in to talk with Marguerite, though she'd given them a sour look when they first entered the room. Tashigi had only to smile at her gently, and she calmed.

"We're not here to antagonize you or anything... Just a couple questions, okay?" Tashigi said, spurred on by Marguerite's seeming acceptance. "Can we sit down?"

"I suppose," said Marguerite. Zoro couldn't help but notice that the sour look remained on her face when she looked at him.

"The other day, we realized something," Tashigi said. "You've never received gun training, have you?"

Marguerite seemed startled and a little flustered. "Of course I have."

"No. You don't have a gun license," Zoro pitched in. "In fact, none of your friends do, either."

" _Zoro_ ," Tashigi hissed, giving him a complex waggle of the eyebrows that he knew by now meant he needed to stop. Then she turned her gaze back to Marguerite, and gave her that soft smile again. "What he means is that you don't see a lot of untrained people who have the ability to shoot a gun with any precision..."

"No, I suppose you don't," Marguerite admitted.

"Where'd you learn to shoot?" Zoro asked. Tashigi hissed at him again, but he didn't relent. "You're in a gang, so I guess that's not unusual. Funny thing though, I looked into it a little deeper, and I saw that you all don't use guns very often... In fact, from what I read, you're pretty proficient with bows. Strange thing for a gang to use these days, but then I guess you're a pretty strange gang in the first place."

Tashigi's face was beginning to turn a light shade of purple, and her mouth had set in the way that meant he was going to get either a fiercely-pissed silence later, or the chewing-out of a lifetime, but he continued.

"As I hear it, you're all pretty new. And very strict about being women only."

"Is that strange?" Marguerite asked.

"No. What's strange is that you've effectively halved our pool of people who could have taught you to shoot guns, and we didn't even have to ask you to do it."

"A woman didn't teach us," Marguerite blurted.

"Really. Who did?"

She pressed her lips together tightly, obstinately shrugging her shoulders. "I don't know."

"Come on. Playing dumb is an insult to yourself more than us."

Nothing.

Zoro decided to go with a different route, knowing it was useless to keep prodding her with that. "I think it's interesting that you only started something against the Joker's gang after a certain person was kidnapped." He finally opened and flipped through the folder he'd been holding onto and fished out the picture of Rayleigh, turning it around for her to see.

Her eyes widened slowly, treacherously, and she looked down at her hands folded across her lap.

"I thought so. How do you know him?"

"Who says I do?" she muttered.

"Didn't I just say that playing dumb is an insult to yourself?"

She huffed and glared up at him. "He's a friend of the Snake Princess. And he's a good man."

"Is he the one who taught you to shoot a gun?"

"Yes."

"Did he ask you to take revenge on the Joker's gang for kidnapping him?"

"No."

"Then why did you go after them?" Zoro asked, closing the folder again with a _snap_.

She gritted her teeth. "I already told you!"

"Refresh my memory, or I'm going to have to take him in too."

"It's not just for his sake!" Marguerite said, her voice rising incrementally. "They're bad, they've taken and hurt more people than just Rayleigh, they've ruined people's lives. And if the police can't get them off the streets, we'll do it. It doesn't matter if that makes us bad people in your eyes."

Zoro nodded. "Alright, thanks. That's all for now, we'll get out of your hair."

"No. I'd like to speak to her some more," Tashigi said firmly, and he knew that was his cue to leave them, so he walked out of the hospital on his own and sat in the car until she finished up, then they headed back to the station.

He'd been working again for about half an hour when Smoker came into the office. "I hear you've been having some issues," he said without preamble, dragging on his ever-present cigar.

Zoro paused, fingers hovering over his keyboard. "Not really."

"Yeah, sure," Smoker chuckled. "Let's go to the bar. I'll buy you a drink."

Zoro didn't need much convincing to focus on something that wasn't work or his romantic life, so he nodded, and together, they walked down the street to their usual dive bar. There, they ordered a round of beers and a couple greasy burgers with fries on the side for dinner, and for the most part, they shot the shit.

It was surprising the amount of things they could talk about considering that Smoker was so single-mindedly focused on his job. Usually their conversations drifted about with no real purpose, but Zoro certainly found himself reluctant to talk about his life as of late, so it was lucky that Smoker had taken the lead.

"The brat wants a fuckin' dog," he was saying. With a little prodding, Zoro had gotten him onto the topic of Ace, and it was endearingly amusing to watch how his face softened a little from its regular hard set. "I asked him where the hell he was gonna keep it. He said it could stay at _my_ house."

Zoro laughed. "Yeah. Sounds a little like him."

"He's a trip," said Smoker, stuffing a fry in his mouth. "Sometimes I forget how young he is, then he pulls something like this and I remember all over again that he's just a kid."

"He's keeping you young though, isn't he?"

"I don't know about that," Smoker chuckled. "He definitely treats me like I'm half my age. Doesn't believe me when I tell him the libido of an old man doesn't work that way."

Zoro choked on his beer, but managed to swallow before spitting it out. "Yeah, thanks for that image."

"You're welcome."

"Hey," Zoro said, during a lull in the conversation. "Do you like what you do?"

He'd thought Smoker would scoff at him and ask what the fuck kind of question that was, but he didn't. He tapped his fingers against the bar as he thought before answering. "I dunno, kid. To be honest with you, it was all I ever wanted in life when I was younger. My dad was a cop, so was my uncle. I grew up in a house where bein' a cop was the most honorable, respectable thing you could do with your life. These days, I'm not all so sure it's true."

"Why?"

"Nobody gives a shit about taking care of people anymore. It's all a fuckin' rat race to get to the top of the ladder. Then you've got the corruption and the jackasses who use their position to push their own definition of justice. I guess maybe they're just the vocal minority these days, but I don't wanna be associated with these shitheads."

"Huh."

"Why? You thinkin' about doing somethin' else?" asked Smoker.

"No," said Zoro. He wasn't actually sure _what_ he'd do if he wasn't a police officer, and for some reason, that frustrated him. "Guess I was just curious about the reasons people do this."

"Good. I'd be sad to see you go. You've got good intuition, you know," Smoker said nonchalantly, as if it wasn't the strangest thing in the world for him to dole out praise. "And you're a good match for Tashigi. You work on the same wavelength... that's a little more rare than you'd think."

"Thanks," said Zoro, and for the first time since the fight, he realized that maybe Sanji had been right to question him after all.

* * *

The living room light was on when Zoro got home. To him, it felt almost foreign to see the off-beige walls, the entertainment center with its pictures of he and Sanji, and the coffee table, which had a light coating of dust on it.

Most foreign of all was the sight of Sanji sitting on the couch. He glanced up at Zoro, who took a moment to realize that Sanji wasn't dressed as though he'd just gotten off work, but as if he'd been _staying_ here, comfortably, and once again Zoro felt the surge of pleasure at Sanji being in his space. Of course, it was just as quickly stomped down by anger and annoyance, and he narrowed his eyes. "Having fun?"

"No," said Sanji. His voice wavered between steady, and ready for a fight.

"Then why are you here?"

Sanji sighed, head falling back against the arm of the couch. "This again?"

"Yeah, this again."

"I don't fucking get it, you know," Sanji burst out, suddenly venomous. "I didn't ask you to quit your job. I didn't tell you that you were bad at it. All I did was ask you to _think_ about it."

"And I did, and I decided you were full of shit."

The moment those words came out of his mouth, Sanji sprung up off the couch, legs whirling in an attempt to catch Zoro, who stepped back, having anticipated this in a way. Shusui was sitting on one of the side tables where he'd been polishing it a couple nights ago, when he'd been too tired to walk upstairs, and unable to fall asleep at any rate. He grabbed it and unsheathed it quickly, dropping the saya to the floor.

Sanji angrily charged him without any restraint at all. The swing of his legs was sharp and focused, the force behind them nearly crippling. Zoro blocked as well as he could with one sword, hardly able to get in his own shots.

Across the room they worked, knocking into the sofa, into the side tables, against walls. Things fell from their perches and onto the floor, furniture got pushed around, and through it all, they looked only at each other. It seemed unending; they were falling into similar routines that they'd kept when they were younger: bickering, fighting, lashing out at each other. Zoro hated it, but he felt powerless to stop it, stunned in the face of his own anger.

So focused was he in his thoughts that he didn't see Sanji coming until it was too late, and in the next moment his back slammed hard into the floor. Sanji didn't stop there, though - he crouched down and wrapped one slender-fingered hand around Zoro's neck, squeezing with just enough pressure to make Zoro's breath hitch.

"Fuck your self-righteous bullshit, Zoro," Sanji hissed, holding his hand there. It didn't seem like he intended to actually choke Zoro - more like he was trying to hold his attention, and it was working. "Maybe I don't have any right to ask anything of you, but if you're going to blow up this much over every shitty thing I say, then I'm fucking over it."

With that said, he started to stand, fingers brushing against Zoro's skin as if they wanted to stay in contact as long as they possibly could. But then they lifted away, and Sanji was walking out of the living room and through the front door. Gone once again.

Zoro sighed and rolled over onto his stomach slowly, feeling an ache that went deeper than just his bones. It was a full-body ache of terror, that he and Sanji weren't going to be able to fix this after all.

When they were younger, it had seemed like their differences were insurmountable. But these past months had been teaching him that the exact opposite was true, that they _worked_ together, that they were _good_ together. He didn't want to let that go.

So he lay there for a long time, staring at the wood grain near his eyes and thinking. Thinking about why he had chosen the job that he had. Thinking about whether or not it was something that he could spend his life doing. Thinking about why he was mad at Sanji, because he knew it wasn't actually a fight over happiness. And thinking about how to make things right.

When he'd come up with his answers, he got up and sat on the couch to check his phone. It was about time for Lucci to check in, but that wasn't the name that caught his eye when he first opened his email - it was _Johnny's_. That wasn't unusual in and of itself, because they kept in touch fairly regularly, but it was more often texts and phone calls than emails, so he opened it and waded through the strange jumble of acronyms and misspelled words to the actual message within: they were coming to New York.

A part of Zoro was excited, because Johnny and Yosaku had been his best friends when he was a teenager, and they were still as close as they could be, considering the distance. But another part of him felt awkward over it. Now that Sanji was here (assuming that Zoro actually managed to get him back), he'd presumably be around when they hung out, and that didn't seem like the best idea.

They'd been there for the horror show that had been Zoro and Sanji's first attempt at a "relationship", a term which Zoro was using _extremely_ loosely, and he didn't want them to say anything about it. He knew they would, because they couldn't keep their mouths shut about anything, and that was only going to create more tension, which he didn't want.

After a few minutes, he sent an email back, inviting them to stay with him instead of spending money on a hotel. Then he went upstairs to sleep in his own bed for the first time in too long.

* * *

The next day was a Friday, as well as one of Zoro's off days, and over his cup of tea that morning he thought for a long while about how he was going to approach Sanji in the least threatening way, so as to finally apologize without antagonizing him further.

What he came up with was nothing that special, but it was a plan all the same. He showered and got dressed around five, then took the train over to Brooklyn Heights. There was a side stop to pick up the pizza order he'd called in, then he headed for Sanji's apartment.

Sanji wasn't home from work yet, but he'd been expecting that. He put the pizzas on the counter in the kitchen, then trailed back into the living room and sat on the couch, flipping on the TV for a distraction.

The wait wasn't long; about fifteen minutes later, the front door opened and Sanji came in, looking tired. For a few moments, he seemed not to realize that there was anything strange in the lights and television being on, but once it struck, his head snapped up and he looked wildly around.

Calmness warred with wariness on his face when his eyes finally settled on Zoro, but he said nothing, opting instead to shrug out of his light jacket.

"I brought dinner. I wanted..." Zoro started, only the words caught in his throat. He didn't _apologize_ for things. But... "I want to apologize. I was unreasonable."

Sanji's shoulders slumped a little as he walked into the living room. "Yeah. You were. But maybe I was the one who was wrong. Like you said, it's not my business."

"But it is," Zoro said as he stood, leading the way toward the kitchen. Sanji hesitated for a moment, but followed eventually. "I want it to be your business, I want to trust you with these things... It was just hard for me to accept that you were showing concern, not being overbearing. And it seemed kind of hypocritical coming from you. Pot calling the kettle black, and all that."

"Huh?"

"Your job stresses you out more than it should, too," Zoro said, hovering by the island as Sanji got plates down from the cabinets.

"Yeah. But I love it enough that the stress is worth it," said Sanji once he'd made his way over. He surveyed the contents of the boxes, then got a few slices of the ham and pineapple. It was the strangest combination to Zoro, but he knew Sanji loved it. "Is your job worth the stress?"

Zoro paused in his own selection of pizza slices. "Sometimes."

"Sometimes?"

"Sometimes," Zoro confirmed. "I expected it though. I always knew I wasn't going to like every moment of it."

"Do you remember when you were a little kid, whenever people asked you what you wanted to be when you grew up, you said you were going to be the greatest swordsman in the world?"

"Yeah."

"What happened to that?"

"That's easy for you to ask. You've been reassured your whole life that what you wanted to do was a good idea. You've always known that this was going to be what you ended up doing."

"Yeah, and that's lucky for me, because what can you imagine me doing that _isn't_ cooking?" Sanji asked, and he smiled fondly at Zoro, the first smile Zoro had seen on his face in too long. Something inside of him loosened at that look, and he let a small smile cross his lips too.

"It's just not really realistic for me, is it."

"You sound so _jaded_. Of course it's realistic for you. Everyone knew you were destined for great things."

Zoro said nothing. He remembered doubting his ambitions in high school a little more every time teachers told him his goals weren't _realistic_ , but he'd been more determined than ever after Kuina's accident. If she was going to be in a coma for the rest of her life, if she was going to _die_ , then he was going to be the best, for her sake as much as his. Things were obviously different, now. He'd had to choose something reasonable instead of clinging to the past.

"The point is that I've made my decision, and I'm going to stick with it," he said at last. "If there ever comes a day when I have to take that back, then you can say whatever you want. But until then, this is what I'm going to do."

Sanji nodded. "Alright. I'm sorry. For all of this."

Zoro let out a noise of annoyance and grabbed Sanji by the shoulders. For a second, those blue eyes flew wide in shock, then they narrowed in a final show of anger.

"Stop this," Zoro said. "Stop acting like you owe me anything. Stop assuming I'll leave you if you're not nice to me all the time. I _like_ you, no matter what. Even when you're an asshole. _Especially_ when you're an asshole."

Sanji's face went through several emotions: perturbed, embarrassed, and finally, determined. "I know. I just don't wanna fuck it up. I really thought I had."

"I like you, no matter what," Zoro repeated, and though Sanji said nothing, he finally seemed to let go of whatever had been bothering him.

They migrated to the couch with their plates, and over the course of an hour, they finished off both of the pizzas and several beers. When they were done, they settled together, Sanji's head on Zoro's shoulder. "We okay now?" he asked.

"I'm okay. Are you?"

"Yeah," Sanji said. "I guess the third time's the charm."

Zoro laughed and rubbed his lips against the softness of Sanji's hair. "Guess so."

They were quiet for a while, nestled into each other. Zoro's eyes had fallen shut when Sanji finally shifted around, bringing himself into Zoro's lap.

"I missed you," he murmured between dropping kisses across Zoro's face.

Zoro opened his eyes and looked up at Sanji. They were so close that he could see the almost microscopically tiny freckles on the bridge of Sanji's nose and across the tops of his cheekbones, and the soft laying of light blond stubble peeking through on his jaw. He leaned up just enough to press his lips to Sanji's, and for the first time in a while, they shared a kiss that was completely devoid of anger. It lacked the fierceness of days prior, but more than made up for it in the kind of desperation that came from needing to know that they really _were_ okay.

"I missed you," Sanji said again when they pulled apart.

"I missed you too," admitted Zoro. And he found that what he missed wasn't just kissing Sanji, or having sex with him. He missed the quiet lulls in the day that were filled with nothing but the comfort of sitting beside Sanji. He missed holding onto that slim, powerful body during his sleep. He missed sitting on the couch with Sanji, listening to him make sarcastic, disparaging remarks about whatever was on the TV. More than the physicality of Sanji, he missed his presence. Perhaps that was why he'd been so reluctant to go home, knowing it wouldn't be there.

Something inside of him curled up tight and happy at finally having it back, having _Sanji_ back. Fuck, he had it bad. It was always a frightening thing to consider how much he liked Sanji, but he knew without a doubt now that he was in love. Really, _truly_ , in love.

"Do you still wanna go to the cherry blossom festival?" he asked in an attempt to distract himself.

"Yeah. You gonna take me?"

"Sure."

Sanji smiled, pleased, and pressed another affectionate kiss to Zoro's brow. "Okay. I'll make a picnic basket for us."

"Mm."

They leaned together quietly, revelling in each other for a while. Zoro couldn't get enough of the smoky, dark scent of Sanji, couldn't get enough of his warmth and the heaviness of his body. He felt comfortable and a little tired, and the fact that Sanji wasn't moving at all was doing a lot to contribute to his sleepiness.

"I'm disappointed though," Sanji murmured, and Zoro could tell he was just as close to falling asleep.

"Why?"

"We didn't have make-up sex."

Zoro chuckled and fit his palm against the small of Sanji's back. "We'll take a raincheck on it."

"I'm holding you to that."

"Okay."

* * *

They met up at Zoro's apartment the following Sunday. Outside, it was one of those unseasonably hot days, and Sanji was dressed in a pair of jeans and a short-sleeved button-up with the top few buttons undone. Zoro was dressed similarly - short sleeved t-shirt and a ripped-up pair of jeans, though as always, Sanji looked far more put-together than he did.

"Ready to go?" Sanji asked, shifting the picnic basket he held from one hand to the other.

"Yeah," said Zoro, jingling his keys impatiently. They headed down the front stoop and up the street. The picnic basket changed hands to Zoro so that Sanji could fish out a cigarette and light it. He puffed on it between talking about what had happened at work while he and Zoro had been on the outs, and it was nice just to listen to him talking, regardless of his lack of interest in the subject.

It wasn't a long walk from Zoro's house to the Botanic Garden, but by the time they got there, they were both a little sweaty. Still, there was a light breeze blowing through the gardens which made the heat more tolerable and swayed the trees, making blossoms fall off occasionally. Together, they found a good place underneath a mid-height, shady cherry blossom tree, and soon they were sat comfortably on a blanket that Sanji had produced from the picnic basket.

"I made your favorite stuff," he said as he unpacked the rest of the contents. There were several plastic bento boxes stacked together, along with two thermoses, napkins, and utensils. He began to open up the bento boxes, showing meticulously prepared and arranged sections of rice, fish, grilled and stewed vegetables, and delicate roll-ups of scrambled egg. Then he poured bowls of miso soup from one of the thermoses, and cups of barley tea from the other; Zoro was mesmerized as he watched, but something was niggling at him.

He'd started in on his rice and miso soup by the time he remembered the important detail that he'd apparently forgotten over the course of the past week. "Johnny and Yosaku are coming up next month," he said.

"Are they?"

"Mm."

"What are they coming up for?"

"A Dave Matthew's Band concert? Drug deal? Hookup from the internet? Who knows."

Sanji chuckled. "So do you want me to stay out of the way then, or...?"

"They're your friends too," said Zoro around a bite of fish. It was just salty enough, and he made a pleased noise.

"Yeah, but I don't want to get in the way."

"You wouldn't be."

"Are you sure?" Sanji asked. "You haven't seen them in a while, have you? It's probably better this way. I'd only be underfoot."

"I wish you'd stop doing whatever it is you're doing," Zoro said, annoyed with this sudden meekness.

"And now you're pissed at me again," Sanji said, sounding resigned.

"There are gonna be times when I'm pissed at you and that's unavoidable, but it's not the end of the world. Fuck. It's not like I'm going to break up with you just because I'm pissed at you. I can't even imagine a situation where I'd never want to see you again."

Sanji was silent, distracting himself with his vegetables. "You know I haven't really done relationships before. I don't know how the hell to keep you," he admitted at last.

"You don't have to worry about that." A note of tenderness seemed to creep unbidden into Zoro's tone, and he cleared his throat. "It's not a matter of keeping. It's a matter of _staying_."

That seemed to be an acceptable answer for Sanji, and he nodded slowly. "Anyway, Johnny and Yosaku... they were pretty pissed at me after what I did to you. Once you left, they basically cast me off."

"Huh. You haven't spoken to them since then?"

"Nope. Their numbers changed between when I moved to France and when I came back, I guess. Did you tell them about me?"

"Uh, no. I told Johnny I'd call him soon so that we could sort everything out, but I was kind of in a rush so I didn't exactly have a conversation with him."

"Oh," Sanji said, sounding a little disappointed.

"It's not like I don't want them to know," Zoro said. "You and I were still fighting when I talked to him. I didn't wanna bring it up in case you decided you didn't wanna be with me anymore."

"I like being with you."

"Yeah. Me too."

Sanji smiled and leaned over to knock his shoulder against Zoro's. "Good. Finish up and let's take a walk."

But despite those wishes, they sat on that blanket for close to an hour, eating the remainders of their meal, as well as a delicate light-pink and white cheesecake topped with sakura jelly, in which whole petals were suspended. It was almost too pretty to eat, and Zoro suspected that it would be cloying, but he found he enjoyed it rather more than he thought he would.

After that he felt like having a nap, and so he lay back while Sanji packed up all the dirty containers into the picnic basket. At some point he fell asleep with the warm sun beaming down on him through the branches, and the quiet clink of dishes knocking together in the background. The last thing he felt before he drifted off was either the brush of a fallen cherry blossom petal on his mouth, or the soft touch of Sanji's lips on his.


	15. Do You Realize?

"We had a fight," Zoro said, presenting it as though it hadn't caused him any inner turmoil at all.

"Oh?" asked Dr. Beckman. He flicked his cigarette over the ashtray by his elbow before lifting it back to his mouth. "And how did that go?"

Zoro tapped his fingers on his knee, a nervous habit that seemed only to manifest when he was in these sessions. "Are fights supposed to go well?"

"I suppose not. I wouldn't really know."

"Why's that?" Zoro asked.

"Not that it's really any of your business," said Dr. Beckman, and wasn't this how it always went when he was about to disclose some portion of his private life, as if to make it more acceptable? "But my husband and I got over that at a very early stage in our relationship."

"Hm."

"Which isn't to say that he doesn't have the capabilities of being hostile. I just learned to stop rising to his bait." Dr. Beckman took another puff on his cigarette, then put it out in the ashtray and placed his hands on the armrests of his chair.

"I don't think I'd be able to do that with Sanji," said Zoro, smiling to himself nevertheless. "I guess we're both too good at getting a rise out of each other."

"It certainly sounds that way."

"Yeah. I didn't know you were married, by the way."

"Twenty-four years now," Dr. Beckman said with a smile as he leaned over and grabbed a frame out from behind a stack of books on his desk. He flipped it around to show Zoro the picture it held, of Dr. Beckman himself, looking significantly younger, with black hair instead of gray, and his arm wrapped over the shoulder of a shorter, red-haired man wearing a straw hat and a wide, happy smile.

Zoro recognized that hat, and furthermore, the man wearing it. "You're married to Shanks?"

Dr. Beckman's smile ticked up a notch further. "So you know him after all."

"No, I've never met him. He's close with Luffy though."

"Yes. Luffy's like a favored nephew to him, I suppose. Now tell me about your fight."

"I don't know," Zoro said, suddenly wishing a little that he hadn't brought it up after all. "It came on fast, which I guess is what fighting with him is always like."

"What did you fight about?"

Zoro tilted his head back into the depths of the couch. "I guess he has some problems with my job or whatever. Or rather, that was how it started, and then it escalated."

"And you were...?"

"Pissed. It's not his right to tell me what to do, but at the same time, he sort of had a point. I know he just wants me to be happy."

"Have you made up?" Dr. Beckman asked, then took a sip from his water bottle.

"Yeah."

"How did that go?"

"We, uh... had a couple false starts, but we apologized."

"Hm. Progress."

Zoro nodded, pleased. "I guess."

"So he's no longer upset with your career choices?"

"I wouldn't say that. He's just let it go for the time being."

"The fact that you're trying to work it out though, that's good. Even the fact that you're fighting is good."

"How is that good?"

"As I recall it, a lot of your past relationships haven't involved any fighting at all," Dr. Beckman said, tapping his pen on his notepad.

"No, I guess not." He thought back on Kaku, with whom he'd probably had the most stable relationship to date. They were both balanced people, even more so when they were put together, and Zoro had liked that, but he just hadn't been _in love_ with Kaku. He'd _loved_ him, definitely, fiercely; after he'd found out that Kaku was part of the team going undercover in Blackbeard's gang, it felt like he would shatter from the loss. But it had been a shattering caused by the fear of being alone after two years spent with someone he knew so intimately, a shattering that came from the selfish part of himself that didn't want to be just _Zoro_ again instead of _Kaku and Zoro_.

He remembered suddenly what it felt like when he and Sanji had fought, when he worried that he wouldn't get to see Sanji ever again, that Sanji's was a face that would belong to the past once more. There had been genuine _fear_ when they fought, unlike in any other relationship prior, a fear so bad that he'd even begun to question his own station in life just for Sanji; it probably wasn't healthy, but at least he knew he wasn't _centering_ his life around someone. That was the exact reason why they'd fought: because he refused to do that.

Dr. Beckman seemed to realize he was taking time to reflect on this, and only spoke when Zoro finally looked back up. "Figured anything out?" he asked.

"Eh."

"Here's what I think. I think it's good, because in a strange kind of way, it shows you care deeply about each other. He wants you to be happy, and you want him to understand that that's your decision to make, but you _didn't split_. It shows that you value his opinion, but you won't budge, and you still want to be with him despite the fact that he did something you perceive as wrong."

"There's not a lot he could do that would be so wrong I'd want to split up with him."

"Really? What if he killed a man? What if he robbed a bank? What if he cheated on you?" Dr. Beckman asked, and he seemed genuinely curious.

"I don't think he'd do any of those things," said Zoro dubiously.

"But what if he did?"

"I'd want to know why. And I'd stay by him until I knew. But he's not a murderer, a thief, or a cheater. He doesn't have that kind of heart. So whatever his worst is, I can take it."

Dr. Beckman smiled. "That's a good attitude to have. Useful. I know you probably don't care, but there was a time when I thought Shanks and I would be over for good. Our... careers are very different, you see."

"What's he do?" Zoro asked.

"This and that. He's kind of a freelancer, these days. Anyhow, I knew about what he got up to, but he'd always try to hide it, then he'd lie to me about it. I was understanding, of course - most of the problems stemmed from the lies. It's important to be truthful with each other."

Zoro knew that was Dr. Beckman's way of telling him that those parts of himself that he was hiding from Sanji needed to be laid bare, but he chose not to acknowledge it.

"Well, that's all the time we have for today," continued Dr. Beckman as he stood up from his armchair. "I hope you'll think about the things I've said."

"Yeah, will do." But Zoro knew he wasn't even going to entertain the barest notion of telling Sanji.

* * *

Zoro rocked back in his desk chair and sighed noisily. Shakky had put him on hold close to fifteen minutes ago, and he couldn't tell if it was because she was genuinely angry with him, or if she was trying to teach him a lesson.

So he hadn't been the first to tell her that Rayleigh was back. So he hadn't let her know that he was safe _right then_ (or even within a week). So what? He hadn't known that Rayleigh was so important to her, and had assumed that she'd be happy so long as he was safe and sound.

There was a soft _click_ on the other end of the phone, and then a puff of air blew through the receiver. "Alright, I'm back."

Zoro grunted. "You gonna tell me what the problem is?"

"No problem," Shakky said smoothly. "Just teaching you a lesson. You need that, every now and again."

"Whatever you say. So you're _sure_ Rayleigh hasn't gotten himself into any more trouble?"

"I'm sure. He called me last night. Said he spent the day visiting some friends in prison."

"In _prison_?" Zoro asked, amusement and disbelief coloring his tone.

"Yeah. Some place upstate. He'll probably be back today. Anyway, how bad are you at your job that he actually comes back on his own before you can even get ahold of him?"

"I know, I fucked it up. I'm sorry."

She huffed out another breath into the receiver and made a low, neutral noise. "Oh well. I should be glad he's so competent."

"Great," Zoro said. "Glad you're pleased."

Shakky laughed. "Don't be so bitter. I knew it'd turn out alright one way or another."

"So are you going to answer my question?" he asked.

"What question was that, darling?"

"Do you know a woman called Marguerite?"

"Oh, sure," she said. "In fact, that's probably who he was visiting."

Zoro rubbed his palm against his forehead and sighed. "Do I want to know why you think that?"

"Oh, it's not some illicit affair or anything. He's like an uncle to a friend of hers, so they've known each other a while."

"Who's this friend?" Zoro asked, suddenly suspicious.

"Her name is Boa Hancock. She's an heiress of some sort. Parents passed away when she was younger. It's a long story, really, but we've helped her out a lot."

" _We_?"

"Oh, did I not mention that I'm a friend of them as well?" Shakky asked, her tone hinting that she knew perfectly well she hadn't. "Anyhow, I'm sure he's fine."

"If you hear from him, will you let me know? I want to speak to him."

"Sure," said Shakky distantly, as if she were already on to the next thing. "Though that could take a while."

"Just... whenever," he said.

"Alright. Love you."

"Love you too."

They hung up, and Zoro rubbed his palms deep into his eye sockets until he began to see swirls of color behind his eyelids. This had gotten even more stressful, but an idea was beginning to form in his head - that a man who'd been known to be a gun-toting gang member previously just so _happened_ to have contact with a current gang member who had no history of being able to shoot a gun, it was awfully suspicious.

He glanced down at his phone and sighed tiredly. It'd been a week since the cherry blossom festival, and he hadn't seen Sanji since. Once again, their schedules had gotten tangled up, and it seemed like every day Sanji was off, Zoro worked, and vice versa. On top of that, they were stuck in a loop of phone tag, and hadn't gotten many moments even to speak to each other.

Their six month anniversary was only a couple weeks away now, and Zoro was starting to feel apprehensive. The worst part was that he wasn't sure _why_ ; he didn't think Sanji was going to leave, and he knew now that they could work things out when they fought. Still, there was a tiny part of Zoro that couldn't stop expecting _something, anything_ bad to happen between them before they could get to six months, which hadn't been some great milestone previously, but when combined with Sanji, it seemed like an accomplishment. It had taken a while for them to reach equilibrium, but Zoro was almost glad for that, glad that they'd had so many more moments of happiness than sadness or anger.

He smiled to himself as he dialed Sanji's number. The phone rang and rang with no answer, and he began to hang up when a voice came through. "Hello?"

Zoro put the phone back to his ear. "Hey."

"Hey yourself. What's up?"

"Nothing. Just wanted to see what you were doing next weekend."

"Luffy was talking about wanting to do his birthday thing next Sunday. So I guess I'll be cooking for him. Why?"

"Because I finally have some time off," Zoro said. "And I wanted to know if you'd want to do something."

"I always wanna do something with you." Sanji laughed, and Zoro heard the now-familiar sound of his lighter clicking open in the background. "What did you have in mind?"

"I don't know. I just figured you could come over and we could do whatever."

"Yeah. Whatever sounds like fun," said Sanji. "I'll come over after work this Friday, okay?"

"Alright."

"Hm. Good. I'll let you get back to work."

"Not really doing any work, but alright."

"Bye," Sanji said. "I like you."

"I like you too. Bye." And with that, Zoro put his phone down and let his head fall onto the desk. Another five days, then he'd have Sanji in his home, cooking for him, sleeping in his bed, making his pillows smell of smoke and leather and citrus. He could wait it out.

* * *

Wednesday, Zoro got a call from Shakky telling him that Rayleigh was going to show up at the bar that night, and that if he wanted to talk then he should get over before they opened up. He contemplated taking Tashigi with him for a while, and ultimately decided it would be for the best.

After all, Zoro knew his own shortcomings - he was aggressive, not charming in the least, and was very good at making already-skittish people clam back up. She, on the other hand, seemed to know exactly how to make people feel comfortable and safe even when she was putting them under arrest. And though Zoro knew very little about Silvers Rayleigh, he'd heard Shakky mention that the man had too much of a soft spot for girls.

As if summoned by his thoughts, Tashigi strode into the room. "What's up?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at the troubled look on his face.

"Rayleigh's going to be at the bar this evening. I was thinking about whether or not to bring you along," Zoro said guiltily. It was bad to use her for this, and he knew it.

Her face soured. "Don't underestimate me, Zoro. I'm perfectly capable of dealing with gangsters, you know that."

"It's not that," he said. "Shakky said he has a thing for nice girls. I'd feel bad bringing you along just because it'd make him more likely to talk."

"Hey, we're cops. If we wanna be good at our jobs, we have to take any advantage we can get. Besides, I don't mind. We can keep him in line."

He smiled, feeling like an idiot for worrying about her of all people. Of course she'd do anything she could to make this a more successful investigation, and she could hold her own too.

"When do we go?" she asked after clearing her throat and adjusting her uniform shirt. He hadn't noticed before, but the top couple buttons were undone, and there were several dark bruises along her collarbones.

"Soon. Fun time with Bellemere?"

"What!" Tashigi half-squawked, half-choked. "I don't know what you mean!"

Zoro rolled his eyes and shoved back from his desk. "Sure, sure. Let's hit the road."

* * *

When they piled out of the car and headed inside an hour later, Rayleigh hadn't yet shown up, and though Shakky was behind the bar, she didn't even glance up from her examination of the ledger lying open in front of her.

"Hey," Zoro called over, and she turned her head to look at them.

"Hello. You're early. Want a drink?" she said, directing the question mostly toward Tashigi.

Tashigi smiled and shook her head. "I don't drink, but thank you."

"I wouldn't mind a beer," Zoro said.

"Sure, help yourself," said Shakky distractedly, her focus remaining on Tashigi. "Would you like something else, then? There's bottled water, probably some sodas and fruit drinks in the fridge."

"Water would be wonderful, thank you."

Shakky smiled and headed into the back, only to return a few seconds later with a bottle of water, which she passed over to Tashigi. With their respective beverages in hand, they sat down at the bar to wait.

Silence hung in the room. Zoro watched as Shakky muttered to herself and scratched things down in the ledger, then mashed numbers into a calculator before going back to writing. It was boring, and he was glad when the front door clicked open and a tall, broad old man walked in. He seemed to be rather spry for his age, exactly as Shakky had once described, and Zoro rose. "Silvers Rayleigh?"

"Who's asking?" the man wondered.

Shakky laughed and looked up from her ledger. "This is my little brother-in-law, Zoro, and his partner, Tashigi. They want to ask you some questions."

"Hm," he said. "Yeah, I'm Rayleigh. But call me Ray."

Zoro nodded and stuck his hand out. Rayleigh took it; his grip was tight and strong, but he didn't try to pull that oh-so-typical hand-crushing move. "Good to meet you," said Zoro.

"Same to you."

"I heard you came upon some trouble recently," Zoro continued.

"No trouble that I can recall."

"You don't consider kidnapping to be troublesome?"

Rayleigh laughed. "This body doesn't work the way it used to, or else it wouldn't have happened in the first place. If they'd been able to guess who I was, they wouldn't have tried."

"So you're saying they didn't do it because of who you are."

"Well, who knows?" said Rayleigh.

"I'd think you would."

Rayleigh shrugged his shoulders, but said nothing.

"Alright," said Zoro. "Can you tell us anything about what happened, so we can get all of this cleared up?"

"I don't know. I was knocked out, you see, this body-"

"Doesn't work the way it used to, I know. You said."

Rayleigh smiled blankly, and Zoro could see straight through it to the razor-edged intelligence that lay underneath his acts of incompetence.

"Right," said Zoro. "So what about Marguerite?"

"I don't know anyone with that name," Rayleigh said.

Shakky sighed and tapped her pen against the cover of the ledger. "I already told him we know her. Could you please just be truthful with him?"

"Um," Tashigi finally piped up. "We're not trying to make you say anything about her that you don't want to. We just need help."

Rayleigh seemed to melt before Zoro's eyes. It reminded him very much of Sanji, but instead of being irritating (and perhaps endearing, when Zoro was on the receiving end of it), it just seemed completely out of place for a man so old. "Of course I'd love to help you," said Rayleigh.

"Oh, _thank you_ ," Tashigi said with a smile, and Zoro covered his mouth so as not to let out the chuckles threatening to rise up. She was so obviously playing sweet and innocent to bait him in, and it was working like a charm. "So we need to know who taught her how to shoot a gun, that's all."

"Oh, that's easy. I did."

"Really? Wow, you must be so good at it!"

"Well, I'm alright... You know, it's important to make sure they can protect themselves. I could teach you, if you'd like."

Zoro and Shakky both had their hands over their mouths in an effort to keep their laughter at bay now. Tashigi was playing the old man like a fiddle, and it was hilarious to see.

"Oh, that'd be lovely," said Tashigi. "Only I already know how to shoot a gun. It's part of my job, you see."

"Of course," said Rayleigh, and gestured at Zoro while leaning closer to Tashigi, as if to tell her a secret. "What about him? Does he need to learn?"

"No, he's got wonderful aim," she said, letting out an honest-to-goodness giggle.

"So I suppose if I were to run away right now, one or the other of you would probably manage to hit me."

Tashigi's brows furrowed, and she shrugged. "I don't know that we have probable cause to shoot."

"Heh, just a joke," said Rayleigh. "Running would be a waste of time. I've got nothing to run from."

"You're probably going to have reason in a second," Shakky said through her laughter. "I think Zoro here's about to shoot you on the grounds that Tashigi's a little sister to him, and he doesn't want anyone messing with her."

"She can make her own decisions," said Zoro gruffly. " _Bellemere_ probably wouldn't be too happy to hear about this, though. You'd have to watch out for _her_."

Tashigi cleared her throat. "We're not here to talk about who's going to be upset over some old guy flirting with me! ... No offense."

"None taken," said Rayleigh magnanimously.

"We're _here_ because we need to find out as much as possible in order to arrest whoever it is that was responsible for your kidnapping. Now, Mr. Rayleigh... Were the men who kidnapped you affiliated with the Joker in any way?"

"Not that I knew of," said Rayleigh. "I've seen them around, they're just some street thugs that do odd jobs for whatever gangs will pay them."

"Great. Okay, and so you said that you taught all of the Snake Princess' underlings how to shoot?"

"Yes."

"No you didn't," said Zoro. "You said you taught Marguerite."

"Oh, well... That's what I meant."

"No, you meant that you taught them all. Who's the Snake Princess?"

"What makes you think I've ever met her?" Rayleigh asked.

"Something Shakky said got me thinking. This Boa Hancock, she's a longtime family friend, isn't she?"

There was a nigh-imperceptible twitch of Rayleigh's mouth, but Zoro caught it and latched on even harder. "You helped her through some trouble when she was younger, right? Marguerite is a friend of hers. Possibly a subordinate?"

Rayleigh's lips pursed together tightly, and for the second time, Zoro saw the deadliness that lay behind that cheerful, calm exterior.

"Anyhow, Shakky said she's like a niece to you. So you'd feel obligated to help her out through anything, right? Say, if she decided she wanted to put an end to a rival gang?"

"I've done nothing wrong," Rayleigh said, eyes turned dark and serious. "And the Snake Princess isn't Boa Hancock."

"You might not have intentionally done anything wrong, but your _actions_ have started a chain-reaction to something wrong," Tashigi said solemnly. "We need you - _and_ Boa Hancock - to help us make it right."

"How the hell am I gonna do that? And the Snake Princess _still_ isn't Boa Hancock."

"Tell her to stop. Tell her that we can take care of it, but we have to know everything she knows."

Rayleigh laughed. "She's not doing anything!"

"Right. But she _is_ a friend of Marguerite's, so she still might know something that could help us. Can we speak to her?" Tashigi asked.

"I'm not sure how she'd feel about that. She hates outsiders, especially if they're men," said Rayleigh with a glance at Zoro.

"So that explains why her whole gang consists only of women," Zoro said.

Rubbing his palm across his forehead, Rayleigh finally slumped in defeat. "Okay, listen. Her gang isn't like all these other gangs. Yeah, she's arrogant and selfish, but she's not out to make a profit off of the little people. She's trying to protect them, especially with all the kidnappings happening these days."

"Here's what I think," said Zoro. "I think you _let_ yourself get kidnapped, went in to scope the place out, then reported back to her with what you saw. At the same time, you created a reason for her to start a war under the pretense that they'd wronged someone close to her."

"Even if that was the case, why would I have taught them to shoot?"

"Who the fuck takes a bow to a gunfight?" Zoro asked.

"Point. I still can't get you in to talk to her, though."

"Not even me?" Tashigi asked.

"Doubtful."

"I'll talk to her for you," said Shakky. "See what I can do."

"Thanks," Zoro said.

"Now you owe me another," she continued.

Zoro sighed as he stood up from the barstool, but nodded. "Alright. Let me know."

* * *

Friday and the majority of Saturday were largely uneventful for Zoro and Sanji. They had done the usual things together - eating, sleeping, and sex, with a trip to the movie theatre on Saturday night.

It was a nice return to the form of their usual lazy weekends, and on Sunday, they woke late and had lunch with the windows open, the sounds of people laughing and horsing around pouring through. Then they showered and dressed again before heading over to Luffy and Nami's apartment, which was empty of everyone but Zoro, Sanji, Nami, and Luffy. As time passed, with Luffy in the kitchen heckling Sanji as he cooked, no one else showed up either.

"Is it just us?" Zoro finally asked Nami, who had been reading the financial section of the newspaper instead of paying attention to him. He didn't mind, as he had thus far spent _his_ time playing rounds of solitaire on his phone instead of paying attention to _her_.

"Yes." She said nothing else, and Zoro was quiet for another few minutes, wondering if she just didn't feel like elaborating, or if she was amusing herself by seeing how long he could keep quiet. Apparently, she still hadn't learned that Zoro was perfectly alright with one word answers, and wasn't at all bothered by hers.

"Well, I'm going to the kitchen then," he said, and stood to do just that.

Inside, Sanji was at the stove, though he was twisted slightly away as he shoved his foot further into Luffy's face, pushing him back every time Luffy tried to surge forward.

"Hold him back for me," Sanji said on noticing Zoro's arrival, and for a moment, Zoro almost considered doing it. But the urge to annoy Sanji was always strongest underneath everything, and instead of pulling Luffy away, he decided to join him in ganging up on Sanji.

The first thing he did was to reach over into the sizzling pan, grab a few hot chunks of chicken, and begin tossing them into Luffy's mouth from a distance.

"Oi, asshole. Do you want to eat tonight or not?" Sanji asked, narrowing his eyes. The next time Zoro's hand came for the pan, he slapped the back of it hard with his spatula, and Zoro drew away only momentarily. When Sanji relaxed, Zoro shot forward again, plucking up a couple more chunks and lobbing them at Luffy, who caught them hungrily.

Sanji was full-on glaring at him now, and when Zoro reached out for yet more chicken, he lifted the pan away. Unfortunately, Zoro didn't anticipate the movement quickly enough, and his fingers came in contact with the hot pan instead of the chicken; he reared back, flinching more out of shock than pain.

Sanji put the pan down immediately, reaching out to grab for the wrist of Zoro's injured hand. "Shit, I'm sorry."

Zoro grimaced, clenching his hand tight at his side as if to prove that he didn't need to be babied, but that just made the pain worse.

"Come here," Sanji coaxed, latching onto his bicep and pulling him toward the sink. He turned the tap on with one hand, and forced Zoro's under the stream of cold water with the other.

Slowly, the pain receded in Zoro's fingers, and Sanji's grip loosened, then dropped away. "It's not so bad," Zoro said, looking at the small reddened marks of the burn.

"No." Sanji pulled up his sleeve a little, and showed Zoro a long, thin strip of shiny skin. He'd noticed it before, of course, but had never asked Sanji what it was. "You know, the interesting thing about burning yourself really badly on a long, hard night at work is that sometimes you barely even notice it until most of your skin is charred off."

Zoro laughed and leaned forward, stroking his fingertips over the oddly-textured skin. "It looks cool."

"I'm gonna cover it up someday," Sanji said, but he seemed oddly proud of that scar. He took Zoro's hand again, lifting it toward his face, and sucked the burnt fingertips into his mouth, brushing his tongue over them a few times. Zoro's body twitched toward him, but he held his ground, biting his lip and refusing to let out the tiny sound that had stuck in his throat. Then Sanji released him.

At that exact moment, they both seemed to realize that it was far too quiet in the kitchen, and their heads whipped toward Luffy, who was standing at the stove, cheeks stuffed full. The pan was empty of everything that had once been inside, and Sanji sighed loudly. "Oh, fuck it. Just order takeout."

Luffy beamed at him. "It was delicious Sanji, thanks!"

* * *

There were beer bottles and pizza boxes strewn across the coffee table, crumpled napkins sitting among emptied cups of garlic butter, several containers of ice cream drooling their remainders out onto the glass. And on the couch sat four bodies squeezed together too tightly for comfort, but all were so exhausted that none of them seemed to care.

Sanji shifted languidly. He was half on top of Zoro, the wallet in his back pocket leaving a harsh indent in Zoro's left thigh.

Zoro knew that Sanji had reached the nebulous, floating wooziness of beer drunkenness, which was different from hard liquor drunkenness in that it didn't last anywhere near as long, but made Sanji very touchy-feely and happy. Zoro approved of it greatly.

"Somebody should buy me DVDs of my favorite childhood cartoons. Sabo would do that for me, if he was here," Luffy said, in continuation of the conversation they'd been having for the past twenty minutes about the things they missed from childhood, or something like that. Zoro hadn't really been listening.

"We'll return your birthday gift then," Sanji sighed as he fiddled with his lighter.

"What did you get me?" asked Luffy excitedly. He flailed around before landing on Sanji, and Zoro grunted at the addition of more weight.

"I guess you'll never know now."

"I want to know!"

"You can't," Sanji said simply, and when Luffy started flailing even harder, Zoro reached past and shoved him off. He landed on the floor with a loud thump, but was back up again in no time.

"Zoro, tell me what it is," Luffy wheedled.

"Don't tell him what it is," said Sanji.

"Tell me!"

"Don't you dare."

"Tell me!"

" _Idiots_ ," Nami said.

"Tell me, tell me, tell me!"

"It's just an autograph," Zoro said nonchalantly.

"Aw, what?" Luffy pouted and crossed his arms over his chest. "You can take it back then. I want the cartoons instead."

"What a shame," said Sanji. "Having to take an autographed pair of Montblanc Norland's boxing gloves back to the guy we bought them from..."

"I lied!" Luffy yelled. "Don't take them back!"

"If it's not good enough for you..." Sanji continued.

"It's good enough! It's the best!"

"So you want them, then?"

"I want them!"

Sanji stood, wobbled over to the side table near the door, and picked up the wrapped box, then brought it back over to the couch. He handed it to Luffy, who, contrary to his normally hasty and uncoordinated manner, was very careful as he unwrapped it, then picked off the tape, and finally removed the lid.

He gaped down at the prize nestled in tissue paper, daring not even to touch, and Zoro smiled sleepily. It'd been hell to get the gift, but worth it just to see Luffy stunned speechless. He remained that way for a while, long enough for Sanji to drop back into Zoro's lap and drift slowly into sleep, and Zoro wasn't long after. And it was Nami who, before she and Luffy went to bed, threw a blanket over them and gently removed Sanji's glasses from his face, then tugged Zoro's boots off for him.

* * *

They were sitting on a bench, watching people walk their dogs and play frisbee. Joggers passed by occasionally, and parents leisurely pushing their children around in strollers. The sun was bright and beaming, the sky blue with large, fluffy clouds drifting by. It was a nice day, and for once, they were getting to spend it outside.

That was what Sanji wanted to do increasingly much as the weather got warmer out, and Zoro was glad for it; last weekend, they had stayed inside and held a quiet celebration of Mother's Day, though there were no mothers around to share in it. It had been hard for both of them, though cathartic in a way.

But this morning, they'd risen early and only stopped for breakfast before hitting the pavement, headed in no particular direction (though Sanji was always conspicuously in the lead, and Zoro didn't have to guess why). Eventually they'd ended up at the park, and they hadn't left since.

There was now less than a week to go before their six month anniversary, and Zoro was feeling mildly antsy, the same way he always did when there was an important landmark coming up and Sanji hadn't mentioned it.

He had no idea how to bring it up. Apparently even having done it before wasn't enough for him to have any sense when it came to this. Each time he thought he'd found a way to ask Sanji what he wanted to do, something cut out in his brain, and he resorted to coughing, or clearing his throat.

"You okay there?" Sanji asked, highly amused by Zoro's most recent failure.

"I'm fine."

"Sure. What's on your mind that's keeping you from spitting out whatever you want to say?"

Zoro shrugged his shoulders and said nothing for several minutes. Finally, he was sick of thinking, and just came out with it. "We'll have been together for six months next Friday."

"I know," Sanji said simply.

"Okay," said Zoro, now stranded in the conversation and unsure in which direction to turn it. Sanji hadn't continued, and so he wondered if that was his cue to just shut up and let it go.

"What do you want to do for it?" Sanji asked when Zoro said nothing more.

"I don't know. What do _you_ want to do?"

"There's a nice upscale bistro I've been wanting to go to. We could have dinner there and then... whatever you'd want to do, since dinner's obviously my thing."

"I don't have any problem with eating good food as a celebration," said Zoro.

Sanji smiled and pulled his packet of cigarettes out, then seemed to remember that he couldn't smoke here, and tucked them back into his pocket. "You always bring these things up first, y'know," he said at length, flipping his lighter open and closed sporadically.

"Huh?"

"Like our one month anniversary, Valentine's Day, my birthday. Now our six month anniversary. You can stop pretending like you don't care."

"I... care."

"I know you do." Sanji smiled, and patted Zoro's knee absently. "But you don't have to be ashamed of it, you know."

_Not shame_ , thought Zoro. _Fear. Cowardice._

Because what he wanted to say in this moment, more than anything, was _I love you_. But he remembered the last time he'd told Sanji he loved him, a little over ten years ago, and how badly that had turned out. He told himself that he wasn't scared, but he was. He was scared of hearing Sanji laugh in his face (again), scared of Sanji saying that Zoro was lying (again), and the thing that made him most scared of all was having to hear Sanji say (again) that he didn't love Zoro, could never love Zoro.

So he didn't tell Sanji that he loved him. He made a decision right then and there to never say it until Sanji had first, even if that meant he never got the chance to say it again.

"I'm glad that you're still able to care about me that much," Sanji continued. "I've always worried that you wouldn't think me genuine anymore. Just... thank you for taking a chance on me."

Zoro nodded. But it wasn't as though he had consciously decided to take a chance on Sanji. It was that, Zoro being who he was, with the history they'd had, he didn't have a choice in the matter. There was no instance, no conceivable point in time, that he _couldn't_ have taken a chance on Sanji.

* * *

The following Friday, they met up outside of the bistro in Williamsburg. Sanji was, as usual, immaculately dressed, this time in a pair of dark gray trousers and a short-sleeved light blue-gray button up that set his eyes off perfectly, as well as revealing his tattoos (which Zoro found pleasing beyond measure; he'd never exactly had a thing for tattoos before Sanji came along, but that was quickly changing). It was finished off with suspenders and a pair of black and white wingtip brogues, and his hair fell loose and natural, slightly wavy, around his glasses-clad eyes.

As if realizing exactly what Zoro was looking at, Sanji sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "Sorry. I got off work later than I'd been hoping, and I didn't have time to fix my hair."

Zoro pushed Sanji's hand out of the way and dragged his own through the soft strands, placing a quick greeting kiss upon Sanji's lips. "Looks good. I like it."

Sanji got that look on his face as if he were trying to pretend he didn't care, but was not-so-secretly pleased with the compliment. "Whatever. Shall we?"

With a nod, Zoro placed his hand at the small of Sanji's back and guided him into the restaurant. It was large but cozy, the lighting intimately dim; definitely Sanji's kind of place, in short. Zoro found he didn't mind it either, especially considering they weren't going to be packed in next to anyone else.

After being seated and ordering drinks, Sanji began the process of sorting the menu into _things Zoro would like_ and _things Sanji would like for Zoro to like_. When the waiter came back, despite all the suggestions that Sanji made, Zoro put in for a rack of lamb, while Sanji went for ratatouille with pasta.

"So. Six months," Sanji said, putting his glass of water back down.

"Six months," Zoro affirmed.

"That's pretty good of us."

"It's alright."

"For us, it's better than alright."

"Stop being stuck on the past," Zoro said. He dragged his pointer finger through the condensation on his glass, not looking at Sanji.

"I'm not. Just pleased."

Zoro was quiet, because he was afraid if he said something, it'd become clear just how little he'd expected from their relationship in the first place. It was true things hadn't started on the best terms, but by and large, they were stable and healthy, and anyone could _see_ that they were good together, good for each other.

And it wasn't that Zoro normally disliked himself. He was just like anyone else - he had his highs and his lows, had days where he felt unsure of himself and days where not a piece was out of place inside of him. Sanji didn't change any of that, didn't complete or undo him, but he _was_ the perfect companion. He was somebody that accepted Zoro almost always, somebody that rarely sought to alter him. There was something inexplicable between them that caused Zoro to feel comforted by Sanji's presence in his life, as if he had always belonged there and had finally slotted himself into place for good.

Their days together weren't always perfect, but the positive _far_ outmatched the negative. Zoro was happy. He hoped that Sanji knew that.

When the food arrived, their silence continued and they ate companionably, occasionally trading bites. The cracks of silence were filled with the usual small talk, and by the time they finished, they had effectively caught each other up on their individual weeks.

Zoro supposed it could have been boring if it were anyone else, but for some reason, he could rarely get enough of hearing what Sanji was up to at work and with their friends. Sometimes he'd bring up people Zoro didn't know, but that didn't really bother him or make him worry that Sanji was going after other people. He realized that there was one particularly important thing that differentiated this relationship from previous ones, and that was the fact that there was an implicit trust between he and Sanji, and they never had to question what existed between them.

He wondered if that was because they'd known each other since childhood, or if it was because he'd finally ended up with the one person who matched him perfectly.

* * *

After unlocking the front door and slipping out of their shoes, they made their meandering way to the couch. Sanji seemed to be of the opinion that it was only proper to celebrate their anniversary with sex, and Zoro had to admit he was inclined to agree, which was why he allowed himself to be led with kisses and coaxing hands to the nearest soft surface.

When they landed together on the couch, Sanji on top and Zoro pressed deep into the cushions, they both laughed quietly. It was almost awkward in its intimacy, and Zoro was all too aware that Sanji seemed to think something was riding on this, as if six months would be moot if it wasn't perfect.

"Calm down," Zoro murmured, brushing his fingers through Sanji's soft, productless hair, hand settling at the back of his neck.

"I'm calm."

"Be calmer."

Sanji squinted a little in the darkness. "I don't think I can be calmer than calm."

Zoro sat up suddenly, tumbling Sanji to his back on the other side of the couch, and his hands came around to push the suspenders off of Sanji's shoulders, then to unbutton his shirt. He took his time with it, placating Sanji by brushing kisses across his lips, never quite allowing him to catch Zoro's mouth.

When the shirt was unbuttoned, Sanji went up to his elbows, shrugging out of it, and Zoro shifted back onto his knees, kissing down the exposed skin. This he took his time with as well, though he never quite lingered over one spot too long. He'd drop a bite to Sanji's neck, then trail down and kiss at his chest, lick at a nipple, teeth skittering across the surface of Sanji's skin over his rib cage, a smacking, ticklish kiss on his belly button that left his stomach quivering, and a shift to the side so that he could suck at the boundary of tattoo and unmarked skin.

It left Sanji quivering, but he seemed to have calmed and regained some patience, for which Zoro was grateful as he unbuckled Sanji's belt and tugged down on his pants. He mouthed across the tight fabric of Sanji's boxer briefs, tongue playing at the hardness that was forming there, and Sanji let out a low groan, nudging his hips up.

But Zoro forced them firmly back to the sofa. He licked and sucked until the fabric was soaked with saliva and precome, until Sanji was panting and clutching at his hair, and then Zoro finally tugged them down just enough to blow across damp skin and make Sanji shiver.

"Calm now?" he asked.

"No. _Please_ ," Sanji said, voice cracking right down the center on that final word, and it sent a fire through Zoro, setting part of him alight. Sanji was more accustomed to Zoro's own need to get a rise out of him during sex now, but only rarely responded. And it was simple, but for the effect it had on Zoro, he might as well have used every filthy sentence he knew.

Sanji seemed to know it too, because when Zoro looked up at his face, he had a sharp smirk on his mouth, and Zoro grunted as he made quick work of Sanji's pants and underwear, then picked him up, dragging him into his lap.

From there, it was a scramble for his wallet, which was horrifyingly empty of condoms and lube, then for Sanji's, which luckily had a couple spares. All the while, Sanji was doing his best to distract Zoro by pushing down in his lap, steadily rocking back and forth over Zoro's cock, which, by this point, really _didn't_ need any help in the stimulation department.

He bit hard on Sanji's shoulder as he quickly worked down a lube-coated hand to open him up. Sanji very kindly took the time to undo Zoro's jeans and shove them (and his boxers) down around his thighs, then he rolled a condom onto Zoro and slicked him up.

They settled into place, Sanji up on his knees and Zoro with his hands on Sanji's hips. Sanji pushed down onto him slowly, looking only mildly discomforted, and by the time he settled in Zoro's lap, his eyes were half-lidded, drowsy with enjoyment.

It seemed to never lose its appeal to Zoro. He liked watching Sanji move, liked watching him take his own pleasure, liked seeing Sanji stripped bare of anything but his movements and his skin. He liked nothing so much as he liked the way Sanji's mouth would drop open, or how he'd bite his lip, the way his eyes would flutter and shut, or suddenly open wide. He liked that Sanji hated being still, and he liked that Sanji's hands would flutter through the air as they tried to find some place to rest themselves, then they'd move away seconds after finding a home.

There were times when Zoro found himself lost not in the act of their bodies moving together, but in the way everything else reacted to their moving together; when the air heated up around them, and when background noise seemed to fade away, and the fabric of the couch became almost painful on his overheated skin.

He couldn't keep his hands off of Sanji though, nor his mouth, couldn't keep from pressing up into Sanji as deeply as he could on each of Sanji's downstrokes, and Zoro did the best he could at kissing him and jerking him off, bringing the both of them closer toward their peak. Sanji was appreciative of it, returning each of Zoro's kisses with equal amounts of affection, and it was distracting, disruptive, awful...

No, that was his _phone_ that was being distracting, disruptive, and awful. He grumbled as he picked it up and let out a mumbled _fuck_ when he saw the ID.

"C'mon, don't stop," Sanji whispered, still rolling his hips smoothly.

"I gotta get it. It's my boss."

"You don't have to, _please_."

Obviously Sanji was trying to use Zoro's own weakness to that word in his favor, but unfortunately, that just wasn't going to work. "Just a second," Zoro pleaded.

Sanji rolled his eyes and came to a slow stop, and Zoro answered. "Yeah?"

"Kidnapping. Another one."

Zoro let out a loud sigh. "Great. When do you need me in?"

"Twenty minutes ago. I already tried callin' but you didn't answer," said Smoker.

"Fine. I'll be in as soon as I can get over there."

" _Now_."

Sanji, who had been listening in on the conversation, was starting to move again and Zoro grit his teeth, shaking his head emphatically. But Sanji just grinned devilishly and kept on.

"Okay," said Zoro. "I'm leaving right now."

"You'd better be."

"I am. Bye."

"Bye."

Zoro tossed his phone across the couch, annoyed, and started to stand up and dump Sanji onto the couch, but Sanji wasn't having it. He boxed Zoro in, hands clutched tightly on the back of the sofa, and moved in quick, jerky movements.

"C'mon, I have to go," Zoro said.

"Not yet. You can wait a few more minutes."

"I can't. I have to get cleaned up and go to the station," Zoro said, and it was probably easy to hear that he was half-hearted about it.

"Okay. You can do that as soon as I'm done," said Sanji, dragging Zoro's hand back to his cock. It didn't take much encouragement for him to start stroking again, and within minutes they were doing exactly the same as they'd been before that phone call had interrupted them.

The pull of orgasm soon crept up Zoro's spine, pricking in the pit of his belly, and when Sanji let out a moan and shuddered, the first rush of release escaping from him, Zoro let it go. He pressed up into Sanji's body, holding there as long as he could, feeling his own end come on. When at last his body slumped back into the cushions, he let out a long breath, and then shoved Sanji off of him with no amount of delicacy.

"Wow, you sure know how to make a guy feel special," Sanji laughed.

"I'm gonna make it up to you, I swear," said Zoro as he stripped the condom off and tied it to drop in the trash on the way to the bathroom.

"Sure. When do you think you'll be back?"

"Who knows? You can stay here tonight if you want. I'll come as soon as I can."

"You always do," Sanji said, and somehow Zoro knew that the lecherous grin on Sanji's face was going to be the last good thing he'd see all night.


	16. Burn Bridges

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Recently my buddy [Cae](http://transparensie.tumblr.com) drew some [super gorgeous art](http://transparensie.tumblr.com/post/72752594579/i-need-more-practice-on-buildings-and-things-so) for this fic! Go give it a look-see, I promise it's worth your time.
> 
> Also, did y'all know I've been writing this fic for over a year now? That's ridiculous. I just wanted to say thank you for sticking with this for so long, and for the lovely comments/subscriptions/bookmarks! It really means a lot.

There had definitely been times in his life where Zoro was as tired as he was in this moment, but they weren't coming to mind. The situation report blurred in front of his eyes as the sound of Tashigi and Smoker arguing faded into the background of his consciousness, and he felt himself wavering. Falling asleep while sitting up was becoming an incredibly real possibility.

"Zoro!" Tashigi said, for what could possibly have been the third time in the past few seconds. "Wake up!"

"Hm?"

"You can go home now."

He said nothing as he got unsteadily to his feet. Tashigi grabbed his elbow in a bid to keep him from falling straight back into his chair, but failed. She sighed in exasperation. "Do you want me to help you home?"

"No need," said a voice from the doorway. Zoro didn't look up, but he didn't exactly need to - the sound of those dress shoes clacking across the floor was familiar, as was their carefully polished surface that came into view moments later. Zoro forced himself to raise his head, and there Sanji stood before him, holding a paper bag and a thermos. "I came to bring you breakfast, but I guess you're ready to go home, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Come on, then," Sanji said, shifting the thermos under his arm so that he could pull Zoro up from the chair with one sudden surge of strength. Zoro swayed on his feet, though he steadied soon enough, and then started toward the door. After a moment, Sanji followed, but paused in the doorway to look at Smoker, a critical, angered look on his face that Zoro hadn't managed to spot before then. "Perhaps you should think a little more about working them so hard," he said.

Smoker grimaced as he chewed at his cigar. "Crime doesn't sleep."

"Neither do I when I have to sit up worrying about whether or not Zoro's gotten into something, and I'm sure Bellemere feels just the same about her," Sanji said, tilting his head toward Tashigi, whose cheeks were a tinge flushed. "And Ace probably worries for you, too. So just keep that in mind."

With that said, he seemed to be finished, and Smoker certainly had no reply. Sanji let out an irritable sigh and guided Zoro from the room, through the station, out onto the street, and toward the nearest stairs down into the subway. The ride home was quiet, uncrowded, and Zoro felt safe in resting his head against Sanji's shoulder, quickly drifting to sleep.

Of course he was awoken after far too short of a time, and then he had to coordinate himself enough to follow Sanji along the sidewalk, but they were home soon. There, the first order of business was to get some breakfast into his system, and as Zoro sleepily forked eggs into his mouth, Sanji kept him company by taking up the barstool next to him.

"So. Wanna tell me what that was all about?" he asked after a few minutes, when Zoro had slowed down on the shoveling of food into his mouth.

"You heard the phone call," said Zoro.

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean I know what you got up to after you left."

Zoro rolled his stiff shoulders back. This wasn't something he wanted to talk about; he'd been sitting at his desk for the past twelve hours, and what he desired most in the world at this moment was to fall into bed and sleep it off. A shower could wait, and in fact, breakfast could have waited, but Sanji had been very insistent upon it. Most of all, right now Zoro didn't want to have a discussion about how one of Sanji's fellow employees had been kidnapped, and he much prefered that it didn't come up until after it was all taken care of. "We did a lot of paperwork, talked to some witnesses, and compiled some evidence," he said carefully.

"Alright, let me rephrase this," said Sanji, and his voice was suddenly dangerous. "Do you want to tell me why I was awoken with a phone call at five in the morning from the Baratie's manager, wanting to know if I'd heard from Keimi? And furthermore, do you want to tell me why he called back a couple minutes after that, letting me know that one of her roommates saw her getting taken away?"

Zoro cleared his throat. "Nah, I pass."

"Too fucking bad!" Sanji yelled, so sudden in the stillness that Zoro was ashamed to admit he jumped. "I _know_ her, so it's not like I'm being nosy about some random person, and you don't fucking get to pull this shitty silent act about my friends!"

With a sigh, Zoro nodded. "Alright. But can I please get some sleep first? I'm gonna black out at this rate."

Sanji softened in increments, the anger draining from his face. For the first time, Zoro noticed how incredibly disheveled and worried Sanji looked, which caused him to feel a little less scornful toward all the yelling. "Yeah. Maybe we both should," he said with a nod. And so they did.

* * *

It was late afternoon when they arose again. Zoro was used to it, but Sanji seemed incredibly disoriented, taking longer than an hour to really understand that they were in the same day, and that if he had coffee now, he'd be up all night.

With all of that confusion, Zoro was hoping that Sanji wouldn't remember about Keimi, but luck wasn't on his side - in fact, it was the first thing Sanji brought up when he was feeling more awake. He flopped down on the couch, kicking his feet up into Zoro's lap, and asked, "Okay, so what's happening?"

Zoro sighed, but decided it was best to just get it over with. "We talked to one of the roommates. He said she went down to take the trash out and then he heard a commotion. When he looked out there to see what was going on, she was being dragged away by some guys."

"Well why didn't her roommates _help_ her?"

"Jesus, Sanji. Did you want him to jump out of the window and hopefully kill the guys by landing on them?"

Sanji grumbled, fingers picking distractedly at a hole in Zoro's sleep pants. "It might have helped."

"We're doing everything we can," Zoro said patiently.

"She's important to me as more than an employee, Zoro. You have to promise me that you're going to get her back," Sanji said, sounding distressed even as he tried to hide it under reason.

"Yeah. We're gonna get her back. I swear it."

That didn't seem to relax Sanji at all, but he nodded all the same. "Okay. Okay. Good. Who's working on it right now?"

"The rest of the station is on it, I'm sure their noses are to the grindstone."

That answer was yet again not enough for Sanji if the deepening of his frown was anything to go by. Zoro had to wonder if it was because he didn't trust the others to keep Zoro's promise, and felt strangely touched by the idea that Sanji put that much belief in him even as he felt irritated on the behalf of the other officers.

"When do you go back?" Sanji asked after a moment.

Zoro checked the clock with a sigh. "Five hours from now. Nine o'clock."

Sanji nodded again. "Okay. I'm gonna... I'll make you some snacks to keep you going through the night, and some more tea..." And with that, he wandered away into the kitchen, scrunching his hands through his hair fitfully.

Their remaining hours were spent with an invisible, barely-there fracture between them. It was obvious that Sanji was too worried to think of anything but Keimi, and Zoro didn't know what to say to make that anxiety go away. He knew that his only option was to get her back.

* * *

There was an unfamiliar face sitting at Zoro's desk - a pretty, clever face surrounded by masses of bubblegum pink hair. She was wearing a froofy dress and twirling a pair of sunglasses between her fingers, and while she waited for Zoro to get into the room, an eerily pleased smile warped her lips.

"Who are you and who the hell let you take my desk?" he asked warily.

"This is Perona," said Tashigi, brushing past him into the office. "Er. Remember the whole incident with the Shadowcutter? She's the one who took care of it. The FBI agent I was telling you about."

"I'm here to help out with the kidnappings, since you all aren't doing as well as we'd hoped," Perona said, and she had a high, girlish voice that seemed to fit her face perfectly, but wasn't at all what he'd expected.

"Right," said Zoro. "Because we haven't handled these things in the past."

"I don't know. Have you? Because as I've heard it told, Silvers Rayleigh came back on his own. How does it feel to be so incompetent that the kidnapping victim you're supposed to be rescuing got so fed up with waiting that he came back on his own?" Perona asked, with an honest to god giggle. She covered her mouth delicately, and when her hand came back down, her laughter had become a wicked smirk. "So yes, I'm here to handle it."

"Whatever. Get out of my chair."

Perona took her sweet time getting up, and brushed a chunk of long pink hair over her shoulder as she did so. "Let's get down to business, then. I want her back within the next twenty-"

But before she could finish her sentence, the phone rang on Zoro's desk. Since Tashigi was the closest, she cleared her throat and picked it up, tucking it between her ear and shoulder. "NYPD, this is Detective Yamaoroshi, how can I help you?"

There was quiet as the person on the other end spoke, and Tashigi's eyebrows creased together. "He's not in right now, can I get someone else for you?"

Yet again, quiet, and then Tashigi's mouth dropped open soundlessly. She gestured frantically at the phone, mouthing ' _kidnapper_.'

Zoro straightened up, and Perona strode over to Tashigi, leaning closer to the phone so that she could hear.

"Yes, I'm second in command here," Tashigi continued. "Yes. What are your conditions?"

Perona scratched down what she was hearing onto a piece of paper that was probably important to Zoro, but he found himself unable to be annoyed. There were other things to do - namely setting up a trace, which turned out to be unnecessary in the end, because apparently these were the kinds of fools who didn't even know how to hide their footsteps. He had to wonder how the hell they'd gotten the drop on Keimi in the first place.

It was a Ridgewood phone number, and Zoro rolled his eyes, pointing at the computer screen as Tashigi turned her gaze to him. "Found 'em," he whispered, and she smiled, continuing to listen to whatever the person on the other end was saying.

When they had finished, she cleared her throat. "That's all fine, but hear this. Next time you decide to kidnap someone and hold her for ransom while demanding that we lay off the investigation on whoever it is you're working for, you _might_ at least want to hide your number from appearing on caller ID." She circled around the desk, bending down to look at the address on the screen, then sent it on to the precinct covering Ridgewood. "Fair warning, the station closest to you is already dispatching. In fact, they'll be there any minute now. If I were you, I'd start running. Because when I get there, you'll be getting another earful."

It was such a tame threat, Zoro had to cover his mouth to keep from letting the laughter out. He noticed that Perona did the same, and had to admit that he felt a little fondness for her at that.

"Yes. Thank you for your time," Tashigi said, and hung up, looking smug.

"Let's hit the road, then," Perona said.

The place they pulled up to some time later was an all-too-cliche abandoned warehouse, though at the moment, it was crawling with officers and EMTs. Perona and Tashigi didn't take long to join the fray, though Zoro was a bit more reluctant to do so and chose instead to make his way into the building.

It was empty, as he'd expected, but he clomped up and down the stairs several times, opening doors and traversing the length of each floor. By the time he reached the top, he'd gathered a posse of straggling officers who had offered their assistance. But there was no one that they could find, and when Zoro headed back downstairs, Perona and Tashigi had finished up and were waiting on him.

"She's fine," Perona said. "Lucky for you."

As if it was his fault in the first place. He gave her a disbelieving look, but thought better of starting something with her. "Where is she now?"

"Still with the EMTs. They think she's shocked," Tashigi said.

Zoro nodded, and headed toward the flashing lights of the ambulance, squeezing between cop cars and lingering officers. When he spotted her, she was being tended to by a couple of busybody medics, but she raised her hand in a wave when she saw him.

"Zoro!" she called.

"Hey," he said, pushing an EMT out of the way none too gently. The guy glared at him, but didn't fight it, and Zoro took the place he'd vacated. "You okay?"

"Yeah. They didn't hurt me or anything. I was just... scared."

He nodded. "I bet it's scary."

"It was really awful. They just... got the drop on me. I guess because I was listening to music on my phone the whole time, and wasn't paying enough attention." She let out a sniffle, and Zoro very firmly didn't look - perhaps it was because of his many years dealing with Kuina, who became _very_ slap happy when she thought Zoro was seeing her at too emotional a level, but he was always cautious about looking at people when they were close to tears.

"That's not your fault though," he said. "You didn't let yourself get kidnapped. They did it to you."

She lifted a small hand out of the blanket wrapped around herself, and wiped her face quickly. "I'm okay though. I'm good."

"Sanji's worried about you."

"I'm fine," she repeated. "Everything's alright now."

"I believe you. Are you gonna be okay to go home tonight?"

"Yeah. Hatchan and Pappug are gonna come pick me up and then we're going back home."

"Good. I'm assuming Tashigi already got your statement?"

"She did. She's very sweet."

Zoro nodded awkwardly, not really knowing how to comment on that. "Uh huh. Well. I'm gonna sit with you until your roommates get here, and then we're going to head back to the station and look through what we've got. If I need anything else, would you be alright to talk about it?"

"Of course," she said. "Thank you."

"Yeah."

And when her other hand snuck out of the blanket and gripped his arm tightly, he let her. This was something he could do; he wasn't good at words, but he could be there, and he could be solid.

Together, they waited quietly until her two roommates showed up. Zoro knew Hatchan on sight - a burly, older black guy that used to get into trouble a fair amount, but he owned a little takoyaki place that Zoro ate at occasionally, and he was a good enough sort. The short, scrawny Native kid with ginger hair that stood next to him was a stranger, though. Still, they took her into their fold, both of them carefully checking her over for any injuries, and after a few minutes of this ritual, they finally piled into a taxi and left.

Zoro stood and stretched his arms up, letting out a loud yawn. As he made his way back to Tashigi and Perona, the ambulances and police cars began filtering away, and soon, the tiny parking lot was practically empty. Not in the mood to stick around, the three of them climbed into the squad car, and as Tashigi started the engine, Zoro glanced back at the warehouse, feeling unease coil through his gut.

They'd never know it, but it was good that they left when they did. Because despite their efforts, searching high and low and being unable to find anyone, there was a person who _could_ find those hiding. And when he found them, his worthless hirelings who had failed him yet again, he showed no mercy. They were dead before Zoro, Tashigi, and Perona had gotten four blocks away.

* * *

Sanji was asleep when Zoro got home, curled up on the bed without having even climbed beneath the sheets. He was dressed in his clothes from the previous evening - a pair of track pants and one of Zoro's ratty black t-shirts. Zoro smiled at him, reaching forward to brush a few strands of hair away from Sanji's closed eyes, then sat down on the edge of the bed to take his shoes off. A glance at the clock showed that it was early in the morning, but despite his mind feeling tired, his body seemed to be wide awake.

As if to taunt him, Sanji remained asleep. After a couple seconds of debate on whether or not to awaken him, Zoro leaned over and shook him a couple times until his eyes fluttered open.

"Hm?"

"We got her back safe," Zoro said. "She went back home with Hatchan and Pappug."

"Good," Sanji sighed sleepily. "Did you catch the bastards who did it?"

"There was no one," Zoro said. "But there's a lot of evidence. They're probably figuring it out right now."

"Mm. Good." And with that, Sanji drifted right back to sleep, his tired drawl trailing off as he started breathing heavily again.

Zoro pressed a kiss to his cheek, feeling partially exasperated, but mostly glad that Sanji wouldn't have to worry anymore. He backed away from the bed and headed downstairs.

It didn't take long at all for his phone to start trilling once he'd gotten himself relaxed. His first thought was that it was work calling to let him know of yet another disaster, and he considered letting it ring through to voicemail, but in the end, duty won over irritation.

And anyway, the voice he heard on the other end didn't belong to anybody at work - it was Johnny.

"You never called back, bro!" he complained. "We're gonna be there at the end of the week."

"Oh."

"That gonna be a problem?"

"Nah."

"You're being kinda quiet. What's up?"

"I'm tired," said Zoro. "And in the middle of eating breakfast."

"My bad, I'll make it quick then. We'll be there on Friday at ten in the morning. Can you pick us up from the airport?"

"Sure," Zoro said, making a note on the pad of post-its sitting nearby. He paused, the niggling feeling that he had something to say tugging at the back of his mind, but since it didn't make itself known in any decent amount of time, he sighed and gave up. "See you then."

"Yeah, bro. Looking forward to seeing you again!"

"You too," said Zoro. "Bye." He hung up and put the phone down, finished off his sandwich, and thumped upstairs to finally climb into bed beside Sanji, settling himself around the warmth of him.

* * *

Instead of going to work at his regular time on Friday, Zoro had plans to pick Johnny and Yosaku up at ten, drop them at home, then head into work for a few hours, and finally come back home to Sanji. This, after all, was their routine now: every Friday, unless something truly important was going on for either of them, Sanji would come over to Zoro's house, and they'd spend the weekend together. Zoro had to admit that it was comfortable, and he was glad to not have to spend all of his time in Sanji's rather sterile apartment, while still getting to be with him.

And with his mind so full of Sanji as he stood waiting in the airport, he finally realized exactly what it was he'd forgotten to tell Johnny and Yosaku. _Sanji_. All of his effort was suddenly concentrated on not slamming his head against the nearest hard surface.

" _Broooo_!" came the battle cry of Johnny and Yosaku, and the next thing Zoro knew, he was engulfed in two sets of strong arms, dragged off the ground with the force of them.

"Hey," he wheezed as they squeezed even tighter. "Put me down, idiots."

They dropped him back to the floor, wide smiles on their faces, and even as Zoro dwelled upon their inevitable reactions, he found himself smiling just as widely.

"C'mon," he said, turning toward the exit. "I gotta get over to work before too long."

They caught up on either side of him, bags banging against him, and made their way through the crowds of people in the airport. Their chatter was about the usual things - work, bands, their cats, people that Zoro used to know back in Maryland - and it lulled him into a sense of ease as they loaded up a taxi and rode back to Zoro's house.

But once he'd set them up in one of the third floor bedrooms that was mostly used for storage, he knew he had to bring it up. Clearing his throat, he quirked his mouth to the side, then grumbled with irritation. "Eat whatever you want in the fridge, use anything you need in the shower, watch as much pay-per-view porn as you like, I don't care what you do today. But... listen. Whatever or... whoever you see tonight, promise me you won't act like jackasses."

"Yeah, definitely," Yosaku said. "Any friend of our bro's is a friend of ours!"

Zoro let out a grim laugh and headed for the door. "I'm going to hold you to that."

It couldn't be that bad, really, could it? It was a long time ago now; Zoro had been able to move past it, and he had bore the worst of that situation. Anyway, they'd be able to see how happy Sanji made him now. He told himself these things as he rode the subway to work, and was in a cautiously optimistic mood as he walked into his office.

Perona was sat at his desk, just as she had been for several previous days, and he felt his mood drop instantly just from seeing her face.

"Hey," she said, smiling at him. There was something about it that seemed teasing rather than friendly, and it had a habit of putting him on the defensive. "So we got a call from the family of one of our kidnapping suspects. He hasn't been home in the past week; that makes the fourth and last one. Once again, they've all been wiped out. Deeper and deeper down the rabbit hole."

"Don't you have anywhere else to be?" Zoro asked. "Your job's gotta be pretty important, after all."

"Yeah," she said, grin twitching up just enough to make him want to snarl at her. "But it's so much more fun to bother you."

"I bet," he said, dropping his keys and phone on the desk. "Great. So once again, we're without suspects, and nowhere to go to stop this."

"This is getting ridiculous," said Tashigi as she walked into the office, eating out of a styrofoam container between words. "There has to be a way to stop this. Have you heard from Shakky yet?"

"Uh, no. Was I supposed to?"

"Remember? She said she was going to talk to the Snake Princess and see if she could get us in."

"Oh. I'll call her this afternoon," Zoro said.

"Thanks." Tashigi smiled at him, and from her, it was comforting and grateful rather than unsettling. Almost enough to make him feel better about wasting his life waiting for a solution to present itself.

* * *

Despite regaining and maintaining his optimism throughout the day, it drained away when he got home that evening. The house was suspiciously silent. He dropped his keys on the side table and trailed into the living room, where a stalemate seemed to be taking place between Johnny, Yosaku, and Sanji.

"Getting acquainted, I see," he said.

Sanji's gaze snapped over to Zoro's, an angry frown marring his lips. "You didn't tell them," he accused.

"I forgot."

"What the fuck is _he_ doing here?" Yosaku asked. He jabbed his index finger in Sanji's direction with an unnecessary amount of force, and Sanji looked like he was a step away from kicking it clean off his hand.

"I already told you what I'm doing here, idiot."

"And I told _you_ I don't fucking believe it. There's no way he'd be fool enough to take your lying ass back after you broke his heart!" Yosaku yelled.

Johnny sighed noisily. "Both of you stop _yelling_. I'm sure there's some kind of reason for this. Maybe Zoro just doesn't realize he's Sanji? Amnesia? Temporary insanity?"

"I know who he is," Zoro said. "He's Sanji Black. Childhood enemy extraordinaire. I'm aware."

"Also, we've been dating for six months with no problems," Sanji deadpanned, the glare still on his face. "I think he's had enough time to decide whether or not it was a good decision."

Yosaku fell back into the couch and threw his hands up in disbelief. "Why? Why, Zoro?!"

"Because I like him," Zoro said simply.

Sanji beamed up at him, looking something besides cornered for the first time since Zoro walked in the door. "Hey. I like you too."

Zoro smiled dopily back, to which Yosaku made an outraged noise. "I can't believe this!"

"Shut up, or you aren't getting any dinner tonight," Sanji said, and the twin whines of submission that Johnny and Yosaku let out were enough to assure Zoro that he could leave them under Sanji's watch for a little while longer.

Still, he hurried through his shower. There was something that made him nervous about leaving Sanji alone with the two people who best knew how he had felt for Sanji all those years ago. And Sanji's current presence in his life felt incriminating enough without them commenting on it. He didn't know how to show them that he really _loved_ Sanji without letting Sanji see it, and at the same time, he wasn't sure why he thought he had to prove anything to them.

After leaving the bathroom, he sat quietly on the bed, towel wrapped around his waist as he stared silently and unseeingly in front of himself. It was only the sound of his phone ringing that drew him out of his revery, and he barely bothered to check the caller ID before picking up.

"ZORO!"

The scream of his name caused him to recoil in shock. "... Luffy. What do you want?"

"Next Friday's my championship fight! You're gonna come, aren't you?"

"Yeah," Zoro said. "If you can get tickets to us by then."

"Mn, I'll talk to Nami about it. But no matter what, you better be there!"

"We'll see."

"Say yes!"

"Geez, fine, we'll be there."

"Right! Good. Bye then!" There was a tinny screech as Luffy slammed the phone down, and Zoro winced, then sighed.

Talking to Luffy on the phone was always strange and disjointed, and this call had been no different, but it left him feeling a little bit better than he had - or at least a bit more distracted from all the things that were piling up on top of him.

After putting on a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt, he padded down the stairs and into the kitchen. Sanji was at the counter, chopping up tomatoes and onions, and Zoro crossed the room only to come to a hesitant stop behind him. He was aware of the lack of noise from the living room and of the presence of people who weren't _them_ in the house, but in the end he wrapped his arms around Sanji's waist, resting his lips against the bony point of one shoulder.

"Sorry about whatever that was," he said.

"I expected it, I guess," said Sanji, peeling off leaves from a head of lettuce. "It's fine. Not like you're going to stop dating me because of them, right?"

"Nah," Zoro said. "I don't need their approval."

"I know," Sanji sighed. It almost seemed like there was some sadness in it, but Zoro wasn't going to assume that. Most likely, it was irritation. "Go check on the burgers, will you?"

"Sure," Zoro said. He stepped away from Sanji's tensed form, wishing suddenly that he'd been more considerate, that he'd cleared this up with Johnny and Yosaku beforehand. They were his friends, but Sanji was... He was Sanji, the one who'd gotten away but come back. He was Zoro's equal, the one that Zoro thought about more often than he thought about booze and sleep. And he was someone that Zoro didn't think he could bear to lose even one more time. He wanted Sanji to be happy, didn't want to see him sad and cornered by anyone, let alone by people who Zoro counted as friends.

Distractedly, he slipped out onto the back stoop. The stray cat was sitting on the railing, its bright eyes lazily tracking Zoro as he moved the short distance to the grill. He stared back at it, lifted a hand warily, and when the cat remained in place, gingerly stroked over fur that was gritty with dirt. After a few seconds, its eyes fell shut and a persistent hum rumbled through its chest.

He smiled, petting it a few moments longer before he checked the burgers, though he had no idea what he was supposed to be looking for in them. At the very least, he could tell they weren't burning, and that was good enough for him.

When the door opened behind him, Zoro supposed he'd been lingering too long. He turned, ready to see Sanji, but paused upon finding Johnny instead.

"Hey," said Johnny.

"Hey," Zoro replied cautiously.

"I'm not here to yell at you or question your decisions or anything."

"Good."

"I just... it's not like before, is it? Because I don't want you to go through that again."

"It's not like before," Zoro confirmed. "He's changed. We've both changed."

"Are you in love with him?" Johnny asked.

"Yes." And it was a simple confirmation, but it was the first time he'd spoken it aloud, and a combination of fear and happiness crept through his chest. He knew he'd loved Sanji for a very long time, and he'd been _in_ love with him once, many years in the past. But that hadn't really come back when they met again. This love was something formed anew, replacing the broken, cracked shell of his old love for Sanji. The new love was pleasing, comforting. Genuine. "I'm in love with him."

"Is he in love with you?"

"I'm not sure."

Johnny shrugged, and his mouth quirked to the side in a depreciative smile. "Well, what can you do? As long as he treats you well, then I'm happy. I'll try to keep Yosaku from shitting himself over all this."

"Thanks."

The door opened again, and this time it was Sanji who stepped out, already lighting a cigarette. He glanced distrustfully toward Johnny before taking the spatula from Zoro and flipping the burgers. Even when that was done and he'd put the spatula back on the side of the grill, he stood hunched and reluctant to turn around, puffing on his cigarette like it was his lifeline.

"I don't forgive you, you know," said Johnny. "But it's good to see you again."

"You too," said Sanji guardedly as he turned around.

"And thanks for taking care of our bro for us."

"It's no problem."

Johnny nodded and reached out a hand, and though it took Sanji a few moments as he stared at it, he finally accepted the handshake. The smile on his face was restrained, but he appeared to be relieved, and when they headed back inside with a plate full of hamburgers, there were no small, barbed words between them.

Of course, that didn't account for Yosaku, who was still a nuisance filled with dissatisfaction. For a while, dinner was fairly awkward, at least until Zoro got out the booze, and then he seemed to completely forget about his desire to be rude to Sanji.

That night, everyone went to bed equal parts tipsy and full, and when Sanji and Zoro were finally alone in his bedroom, it was easy to pull each other close.

"I'm not sure it was a good idea letting them come up here," Zoro sighed.

Sanji smiled against his neck, then moved his mouth up to tug lightly at one of Zoro's earrings with his teeth. "It's not so bad. You know I can kick their asses if they get any worse."

Zoro laughed as his fingers worked to unbutton Sanji's shirt. He pushed it off of narrow shoulders and onto the floor, and Sanji tugged Zoro's shirt up and off of him. The rhythm as they undressed each other was unhurried, and silently, they got into bed together. There were kisses passed back and forth, and when the natural line of progression ended at sex, they didn't back away for their guests' sake, but were quiet and careful, breath held for more than the sound of feet on the stairs.

* * *

Sanji was out of bed before Zoro the next morning, and Zoro was perfectly fine with that. It meant he didn't have to listen to Sanji nagging him to get up, but soon, he remembered that they had guests who weren't exactly on the best of terms with Sanji, so he hopped out from under the covers in a hurry, nearly tripping down the stairs in his haste.

The shock he felt upon seeing that Johnny and Sanji were perfectly peaceful together in the kitchen might have showed on his face. He approached with care, all the while alternating between watching Sanji flip pancakes and Johnny mixing whipped cream in a bowl. They treated him to two practically identical grins as he slumped onto a barstool, and Sanji passed him a mug of tea, flashing him a fond, more private smile before turning back to the sizzling pan.

Zoro took his time sipping at it, admittedly confused at seeing just how well the two of them were getting along, even taking into consideration their tentative truce. With all the chatter between them, one would have thought that _Zoro_ was the odd one out.

"It'll be ready in a few minutes," said Sanji a while later. "If you want to go wake Yosaku up."

"Mm." Zoro forced himself off the stool and back upstairs to the spare room, where Yosaku was sprawled half out of his futon, face mashed into the rug.

Zoro nudged him in the side with one foot, and slowly, Yosaku turned onto his back. "Mnhgwhat?"

"Breakfast."

Yosaku sat up, scratching the stubble on his head, and let out a long groan as he forced himself to stand. Knowing Yosaku's usual dress habits, Zoro was overwhelmingly grateful that he'd even bothered to wear a pair of boxers to sleep, and he only got gladder when Yosaku layered on a pair of shorts and a t-shirt.

But then he turned to leave the room, and Zoro knew he had to nip this attitude in the bud. "Hold on."

"Yeah?"

"Stop being an asshole to Sanji. I'm not gonna deal with you disrespecting him when you're staying under my roof."

Yosaku frowned. "He's got you whipped," he said, unimpressed, and walked out of the room.

Zoro didn't follow after him immediately. He leaned against the wall, scrubbing a hand through his hair in annoyance. Yosaku probably thought it was for Zoro's own good, but Zoro was already so fed up with this stubborn behavior that it'd take a miracle for either of them to make it through the end of the week alive.

Nevertheless, they managed to get through the majority of Saturday without incident. Most of the day was spent at the park, Johnny and Yosaku playing a game of frisbee while Sanji and Zoro sat on a blanket making fun of them. There was a picnic for lunch, and they nibbled on it throughout the afternoon, then went to an Italian place for dinner, which Johnny and Yosaku paid for in thanks for letting them stay over (though Yosaku _did_ try to skip out on paying Sanji's portion of the bill). At the very end of the night, they stopped by a bar and had a couple drinks, then headed back to Zoro's, and settled in for the night.

Zoro was getting comfortable with the assumption that Yosaku had actually listened to him after all, and that these little reluctances were simply playful jabs. Making it through Saturday, and then most of Sunday, it felt like he'd made it home free, and as they sat down at the dining room table to eat dinner, he was in high spirits. So of course that would be just when his assumption decided to come around and bite him in the ass.

"How many pieces of tilapia?" Sanji was asking Yosaku.

"I'll get it myself."

"Okay," Sanji said. "Do you want green beans?"

"I can get it."

"Right." Sanji rolled his eyes and gestured to the spread of food on the table as he took his seat. "Have at it."

"Can I get a new spoon, actually? I don't want your germs in my food. Oh, wait. Too late."

Johnny shot him a sharp look, but he didn't back down.

"Fairly sure I told you to stop fucking with him," Zoro said.

"Kinda hard to stop doing that when he won't stop fucking with _me_."

"He's done nothing to you the whole weekend," Johnny said. "Really, he's been far better to you than he should have been."

"Yeah, well, he should have stayed home," said Yosaku.

"You're acting like a fucking brat," Zoro said, truly and completely fed up. "You weren't involved in anything that was between us before this. You just think acting all pissed at him makes you look good to me, when in reality, it's making you look like a fucking asshole who can't let shit go."

"Well excuse me for standing up to him since you so obviously won't, because you're whipped!"

Throughout all of this, Sanji had been uncharacteristically quiet, watching them with a mild look on his face. But now he spoke up. "Look, I honestly don't give a shit if you want to act like an asshole to me when Zoro's not around," he said, very calmly but very firmly. "I understand that what I did was wrong, and you're free to hate me for it. I'll be the first to admit that it was a terrible thing, but I regret it every single day. And your constant hostility while he's in the room is about the shittiest thing you can do to him, because he decided to take a chance on me despite that. He decided that I was worth it, and you acting like your opinion is more important than his happiness is _not_ helpful or supportive to him. Anyway, there's only two opinions that matter in this relationship, neither of which are yours, so please grow up and stop acting like some petulant child who can't accept that they're not right."

Yosaku seemed to be speechless, but Sanji just stared silently back at him, visible eyebrow raised as he waited for it to sink it.

"Well," said Johnny, breaking the silence. "If that doesn't do it, I don't think anything will."

And the best part was that it really seemed to do the trick, because when Sanji went to have his post-dinner cigarette, instead of the entirely too conspicuous trade-off of the back stoop, Yosaku went out with him. Zoro kept an eye out, expecting to hear them fighting, but it never happened, and fifteen minutes later, they came in, laughing at something together. For the first time all weekend, Sanji's shoulders were completely relaxed and Yosaku had stopped giving him that cruel look.

* * *

Kuina wanted to meet Zoro for lunch the next day, which he was happy to oblige, not least of all because the station had been quiet and boring for the majority of the morning.

But she was late. He had already been seated for several minutes by the time she showed up, time which he had filled by texting Sanji.

"Sorry, my class ran over so I was late getting cleaned up," she said as she slid into the booth with him. "Have you ordered already?"

"I just got us drinks."

"You didn't get beer, did you? I'm feeling a little queasy."

"Just water."

"Okay. Good. So what's up?" she asked, unfolding her menu and beginning to scan through it.

"Johnny and Yosaku are visiting," he said.

"Cool, cool. How's that going?"

"Well, Yosaku kept starting shit with Sanji over the weekend, but I guess it's been alright other than that."

"Oh?"

They were interrupted by the waiter coming back to get their orders (hot pot for Kuina, cơm tấm for Zoro), and then Zoro took a sip of water before continuing. "Uh, you remember how, after I came back from visiting Sanji before he moved, I told you I kissed him and he was mad at me for it? That... wasn't really the whole of it."

"I kinda knew something had gone down," she said, shrugging. "You don't have to tell me if you don't want to, though."

"It, uh. I... We kinda... had a thing going. I told him I loved him and he didn't feel the same way, and I guess Yosaku was still mad about it."

"What, he's mad because Sanji didn't love you back?" she asked dubiously. "That's kinda lame of him."

"Well, it's probably not so much over the fact that he didn't love me back as the way he handled it?" Zoro said, as if questioning himself.

"Oh. Sanji didn't take it well, I guess that makes sense. So he must've said some pretty bad things to you?" Kuina asked. Concern had overtaken her face, but Zoro didn't want it.

"You know how he was with the macho act back then, but it wasn't anything I couldn't handle. He's grown out of it."

"Ah, so it's just Yosaku who hasn't."

He shrugged his shoulders, not really wanting to badmouth one of his best friends, but also not wanting her to get the idea that he was on Yosaku's side rather than Sanji's. As he tried to come up with an appropriate response, the waiter approached again and placed their meals down in front of them. When he stepped away, Zoro spoke. "Anyway, I think they settled it, so I'm not so bothered about it anymore."

"That's good. How long are they staying?"

"Until Wednesday."

"Maybe we can all get together sometime before then. It'd be nice to see them again."

Zoro snorted. Kuina had been Johnny and Yosaku's main tormentor during childhood, always besting them during practice and lording it over them, which she had done to Zoro too, but with less gloating and bragging. She'd made them cry a fair few times, and he had no doubts that she could still do it. "Yeah, I'll see," he said.

"Alright."

And finally, conversation was set aside in favor of food. He enjoyed meals with Kuina, because she understood the importance of eating over talking. Or perhaps that was just the sibling bond that kept them close enough with each other that they really didn't _need_ to keep up with small talk.

When they'd finished and paid the bill, stepping out onto the sidewalk, Kuina pulled Zoro down into a strong hug. "You're okay, right?" she asked. "No more dreams or anything?"

"... Not lately," he said.

"Okay. I don't want to have to get Sanji to call me every time you wake up from a nightmare."

His body must have stiffened, because she pulled back a little and looked up at him, eyes staring hard into his. "You _have_ told him, haven't you?"

He said nothing, and her eyebrows creased, mouth turning down. "Don't tell him," he pleaded.

"Are _you_ ever going to tell him?"

"I will when I feel like I can."

She pursed her lips, and he prepared to be scolded by her, but she just shrugged helplessly in the end. "Okay, fine. It's your business anyway."

"Thanks."

"Yeah, yeah. I'll call you later in the week, okay? Take care of yourself. Don't let Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee get you into too much trouble."

He nodded, waving at her as she turned and walked away, and he headed off in the opposite direction.

It was strange, but he always seemed to feel much more calm after seeing her in the flesh, and that carried over throughout his day. Even when he had to meet Nami in Manhattan to get the tickets for Luffy's final match, he didn't feel all that bothered about the inconvenience. It all faded into the background, and he felt lucky that something could even manage that these days.

* * *

Wednesday came all too soon, and because Zoro felt bad about spending more time angry with one or both of them than he'd wanted to, he took Johnny and Yosaku to the Baratie for lunch before they had to catch their flight back to Maryland. The restaurant was crowded as always when they entered, but Keimi smiled at him and pointed them back to the usual booth, and within minutes Nojiko had taken their drink orders.

After that, it didn't take long for Sanji to come out of the kitchen, stripping out of his chef's jacket and scooting into the booth beside Zoro. When he greeted the table at large, there was tiredness in his voice. Zoro's fingertips touched the warm, strong thigh that was closest to him under the cover of the table, squeezing tension from the muscles.

"If you're out here, does that mean you're not going to cook for us one more time?" Yosaku asked. "But that was the best part of being here."

"Sorry. The old man might cook for you though."

"What's good?" Johnny asked as he squinted at the menu.

"Everything," said Zoro.

"Any _actual_ suggestions?"

"The beef brisket is good," Sanji said. "As are the burgers and the steak, but those are all obvious choices. I'd suggest the roasted pheasant or the spicy shrimp pasta."

Yosaku hummed softly and folded his menu up, placing it back on the table. "Shrimp sounds good. Haven't had any decent seafood in a while."

Sanji rolled his eyes. "At least you live where most seafood is bound to be decent. I miss crab cakes."

"You guys should come back to Maryland sometime. Make all the crab cakes you want," said Yosaku.

Johnny narrowed his eyes accusingly. "You only say that because you want him to cook for you."

Yosaku looked bashful, but not a single bit apologetic. "He's a good cook."

"That he is," said Nojiko as she came back to take their orders. "Too bad he's not making lunch for me today."

"I told you I would!" Sanji said. His thigh tensed under Zoro's touch, as if he were about to stand, but Zoro pressed him back down.

"Nah, it's alright," she replied with a smile. "You deserve the break. What can I get for y'all?"

They took their turns ordering; in the end, they went for variations on pasta and pheasant, except for Zoro, who stuck with his time-honored tradition of steak. Nojiko didn't even tease, but wrote it with a flourish and left with a smile.

"So, back home today?" Sanji asked, turning once more to Johnny and Yosaku.

"Yeah. We wish we could have stayed longer but Yosaku doesn't like leaving the cats alone for too long," Johnny said.

"Oh?"

"Yeah. They're pretty good at taking care of themselves, but trips longer than a week make him feel bad," he continued. Yosaku scowled and crossed his arms, muttering about how he was clearly the better cat-dad between the two of them.

"Why don't you just get somebody to catsit?" Zoro asked, only mildly interested in the conversation that was taking place.

"Yeah, like we're gonna let anybody from _that_ town watch our house. Half of them would steal all the stuff and the rest would report it as illegal contraband."

"Yes, because it's not like the centerpiece of your living room is a bong. Oh, wait, it is," said Zoro.

"Gonna arrest us?" Johnny asked with a grin.

Zoro shook his head. "I don't care what you do. It's not like I have any authority in Maryland anyway."

"What if we came and took care of your cats for you sometime?" Sanji interrupted.

Zoro whipped his head to the side, wondering what the hell Sanji was up to. Taking a week in Maryland to catsit didn't sound like any kind of fun, and he was surprised that Sanji would suggest it. By this point though, it was plain and obvious that Sanji had a soft spot for cats, what with the stray he was always petting and feeding whenever he was over at Zoro's.

"Aw, would you do that, bro? That'd be so awesome!" said Yosaku.

"Yeah, I wouldn't mind doing it if Zoro's okay with it."

Zoro raised an eyebrow, attempting to start a communication with Sanji via intense staring, but he got nowhere with it. "I guess. If that's what you want."

"You guys are the best!" Johnny said. "Aw man, that'll be _awesome_. We'll have to figure something out. Give us your number, Sanji."

Sanji bit his lip, trying to hold back the smile that was slowly overtaking his face. "Okay," he said, and entered it into the phone that was passed to him before handing it back.

Between all the talking, it took them close to an hour to finish lunch once it came. It was good though, both to see everyone getting along again, and to get to spend time with Johnny and Yosaku without them overly focused on Sanji.

When at last they were done, Sanji was engulfed in a hug by Johnny and Yosaku, and they rocked him back and forth between them. Despite his annoyed protests, he looked pleased when they pulled away from him, and when it came time to say goodbye, he even promised to keep in touch.

Then, as Johnny and Yosaku headed outside to hail a cab, Zoro leaned in to press a couple kisses to Sanji's lips. "See you on Friday?" he asked.

"Yeah. I'll talk to you tonight."

"Okay." Zoro turned and was about to walk away when Sanji called out for him one more time.

"Hey, I like you!"

"I like you too," said Zoro, and he pressed out of the crowded restaurant onto the street, where Johnny and Yosaku were loading up their luggage.

Soon they were all securely inside, headed to the airport. There was a reverent silence in the car that even those two fools knew better than to interrupt, one in which Zoro realized that they had to do this kind of thing more often. It wasn't right that he only saw them once a year if he was lucky, and now that the whole Sanji ordeal was cleared up, he even found himself looking forward to the prospect.

It felt like they arrived before he could even blink, and Zoro's legs were heavy as he got out to help them. The goodbye they shared on the sidewalk was nowhere even close to the one he and Sanji had shared all those months ago, but Johnny and Yosaku were definitely trying to match it for emotion, crying all over him about not wanting to go.

"I'll call you soon, okay?" he said, patting each of them on the back.

"Bro! We don't wanna leave!"

"Go home and take care of your cats, they probably miss you."

They continued to sob on him, and only let go when they absolutely had to. He left, feeling strangely unbalanced.

* * *

The energy in Madison Square Garden on Friday night was like a fire, bursting up, catching on anything it laid its embers upon. People were shouting, _screaming_ , waving their banners as frantically as they could. The noise as Luffy and Hannyabal were brought out was deafening, and it crescendoed, echoing long after they were stood in their opposite corners.

But by the time the referee drew them in, there was silence. Every single person in the room seemed to hold their breath, Zoro and Sanji among them.

Luffy's face looked so determined, even from this distance. Zoro knew how much training went into this, knew how much blood, sweat, and tears had led to this moment in Luffy's life. He had to admit that he wanted to be far more involved in _helping_ Luffy get there, but it was satisfying enough to even see him standing where he was, ready to win.

It wasn't just satisfying for Luffy when he went in, swinging that first punch. It was satisfying for Zoro and Sanji, for Franky and Robin, for Nami, for Chopper, Brook, and Usopp. The idea that they were about to watch Luffy take the next step on his way to becoming the world's best boxer was as humbling and gratifying as almost anything any of them had ever encountered.

And that first swing of the fist was beautiful. It whistled through the air, landing solidly in Hannyabal's gut, driving the air out of him. He didn't go down, but it was close, and that was exactly how the whole first round went - the two of them in tight to each other, determined and hardened, neither of them allowing themselves to be pushed down an inch.

It was a tense round, as was the second. Hannyabal was a large, lumbering man, with a sharply protruding browbone that shaded his small eyes. But despite his size, he balanced his power incredibly well, and was very capable of withstanding Luffy's blows. His stance was the strangest thing Zoro had ever seen, moving like a pendulum rather than a spring, his arms moving in such a way that he was almost always guarding himself and forcing Luffy back at the same time.

It definitely looked to be Luffy's hardest fight yet. Zoro could understand why Hannyabal was the reigning champion, but he also had the utmost faith that Luffy was going to blow it out of the park. If anybody was capable of a miracle here, it was him.

Not until the fourth round did Luffy actually manage to knock Hannyabal down. Even though he was back up before the count had ended, Luffy looked ready to end it, only Hannyabal was back, and more serious than ever. His guard was tighter, his form more solid. And Luffy knocked him down again, and still he got back up, but didn't send a punch.

So it seemed to keep happening, even as the fourth round ended, then the fifth. Luffy never wavered though. He seemed to get more and more annoyed, of course, but not once did he seem to lose faith in himself or his ability.

When the bell rang to signal the end of the sixth round, he went back to his corner, just like he had for the five previous, and he drank from his water bottle and let Saul towel him off quickly, and all the while, his face stayed set in a mask of battle. And when the bell rang to signal the beginning of the seventh round, he stood, back straight and strong, and walked forward to meet Hannyabal.

It was at this time that a large shadow fell over Sanji and Zoro, and the sound of footsteps could be heard even through the din of yells. Zoro turned his head to look, and found himself confused at what he was seeing.

Throughout the course of the fight, he had not bothered to look for any of the regulars in the stands around them, not "Hammock" standing far above them, nor the gargantuan, dark-haired man sitting directly behind them. And now that giant of a man was walking down the steps toward the center of the arena, where the ring lay. Security rushed forward to move him back, but he couldn't be stopped, not as he came to the bottom of the stairs, nor as he pulled himself up into the ring. Even Luffy stood speechless as the man drew back one massive, meaty fist, and slammed it right into Hannyabal's chest.

When he went down, he did not get back up. The entire building was silent in shock, so when the man spoke, everyone heard each syllable perfectly.

"Pitiful."

No one reacted. It seemed like every mouth was dropped in confusion.

"You can't hit him, but you won't let yourself get knocked out either. Pitiful," he continued, gazing down at the unconscious Hannyabal laying still by his feet.

The referee finally seemed to come back to life, and he rushed forward, trying to push the man out of the ring to no effect.

"It's pitiful, don't you agree, Monkey D. Luffy?" the man said, addressing Luffy now.

Luffy, whose teeth had slowly clenched themselves, whose fists had balled up at his sides, whose stance hadn't dropped a single inch, looked as if someone had put dinner in front of him only to snatch it away. "What's pitiful?"

"He only defends, never strikes. That's pitiful."

"You took my belt."

"I don't need your belt. I'm already a champion."

"And I already know who you are, Marshall D. Teach," Luffy said.

Teach smiled slowly, revealing a mouth that had only half as many teeth as it should've had. "Good. Then I want you to do me a favor." He paused for a few moments, then continued upon realizing that Luffy had no plans to say anything. "Up your weight class. Become a heavyweight and defeat me."

Luffy gritted his teeth harder and shook his head. "This was _my_ belt!"

"You said you'd become the best, didn't you? Prove it to me." And with that, he left the ring and walked up the stairs with no interference from anyone, pushing through the double doors and out into the lobby.

The crowd erupted in chaos and anger, but Zoro's eyes were glued to Luffy. He still looked like he wanted to punch the hell out of somebody, and at the same moment, there was an even greater determination overtaking him.

"Calm down! Calm down!" a voice screamed through the speakers. "We'll make a decision now!"

The crowd quieted only a little as the referee and the judges conferred, and when they pulled apart, decision made, it went entirely silent.

"The victor is Monkey D. Luffy, for delivering twelve knockdowns and taking none!" the announcer called out.

Zoro's row screamed and cheered of happiness, but Zoro and Sanji stayed silent, because they were the only ones who saw that there was genuine anger in Luffy's eyes. He didn't look happy that he was now the reigning middleweight champion. In fact, he looked downright furious that he hadn't gotten to finish the fight honestly. And both of them understood that fact.

The crowd continued to go wild, chanting about their champion.

And there Luffy stood. A lone, miserable man, defeated despite his victory.


End file.
